Trinity Chronicles: Rewind
by Demon Eyes Laharl
Summary: How will Konoha feel when it has, not one, not two, but three Uzumakis? Naruto, having lived so long with his two inner companions, Laharl and Buds, is suddenly forced to relive his early days, but can that universe survive with those three running lose?
1. Chapter 1

**Prologue**

* * *

In the deepest parts of Fire Country, hidden away from roaming eyes… a hidden village, filled with skilled men and women in the art of war flocked around their daily lives. An old lady was watering her plants, oblivious by the scouring men dashing from her rooftops. Crowds cleared as those very same men shouted to them to spread out as two shadows, one blurry orange, and the other, a roving purple shadow, moved fast away from them.

The blonde one laughed, slapping his butt towards the men chasing them, calling them names, while the other, whose rather odd purple hair and crimson eyes were slanted slightly, evil looking, but filled with enjoyment. He laughed in a rather odd laugh, making the other scowl.

"That laugh still annoys me. Can't you make a better one, Laharl?"

The one with red eyes, Laharl, looked back at his blonde and blue-eyed companion, full of indignation. "Ah, shaddup Fish Cakes. This is my royal laugh! Be honored to hear it everyday of your life. MWAHAHAHAHAHA!"

"Don't call me that, you… ex-overlord!" the boy who was called 'Fish Cakes' replied. He knew what he was saying because Laharl suddenly scowled back, and suddenly stopped his running, and tackled the blonde, and the two initiated a mini-fight, which caused a ruckus, toppling a wooden fence, and raised a lot of dust.

It wasn't until the moment when the men who were chasing them had stopped in front of the two kids did they stop, and began to look horrified realizing that they were caught. The men looked at the two with ugly stares, and even uglier frowns.

"Well, well… the Uzumaki Troublemakers," one of the men muttered. "You're going to pay, you know that?"

Laharl's hand shot out and punched the blonde's arm. "You're fault, Naruto."

The blonde, Naruto, looked at him, and returned the punch towards the other's arm. "My fault! You're the one tackled me!"

"Well, if you weren't so insulting of my Royal Laugh-"

"Royal laugh my ass!" Naruto cut him early. "That doesn't mean you could just jeopardize the whole bit! Stupid! Purple Head!"

"Dumb blonde!"

"Squinty-eyed brat!"

"Whiskers!"

"Hey! I like my whiskers!"

"Now, now, boys," one of the men who chased them muttered, cutting them off in their insults. "Time to face punishment. You have all the time to insult each other after your sensei gets through with you."

Naruto and Laharl looked at each other, and grinned. All of the sudden, the ground that the men were standing on gave away, making all of them crash into a body of water. As soon as they splashed down, the stench of bad eggs suddenly became apparent as the men's faces reported surprise and utter disgust when their noses registered the smell.

"Ugh.. .damnit!"

"How… when did they set this up!?" the other asked. "I was sure I was standing on solid ground before it suddenly gave way!"

One of the men finally climbed out of the pitfall, and groaned as he noticed the twins suddenly disappeared.

"We've been duped again boys."

* * *

After a few more minutes, the men, their shirts still wet and sticky from the nasty surprise thrown their way, but even then, they knew it was impossible to catch up with the Uzumaki brothers now. Not only did the smell gave away their position, but the two never made a situation ever again, making them, relatively, invisible.

The men realized the tackle then that the argument, and the insults directed towards each other were only a set-up to get them to the pitfall. Those two were creative… those men would know. They had been chasing those troublemakers since they started the whole gig.

As they passed down a couple more streets, two jovial boys sat, hidden high in a tall fence, were giving each other high-fives. Naruto Uzumaki, the Prankster, as he was called, and Laharl Uzumaki, the Trickster, as he was called, were laughing as they watched the men go around the village looking for them.

"Hehe… nice. Didn't even notice you cut the ground while we were 'fighting'," Naruto muttered with a smile.

"Mwahahaha! Of course! I, the great Laharl, wouldn't be caught by some lowly humans!" he replied.

Naruto looked away with an exasperated expression, yet with a smile. "Yeah… never mind it was my plan from the beginning…"

Laharl didn't look abashed, as if somehow the concept of being embarrassed was foreign to him. He just slapped Naruto's back gently with his open palm.

"And you'd never have gotten that plan without me," he declared with such confidence, Naruto felt slightly jealous again how his brother acted. The blonde knew he could act confident… but that was all, really… an act.

"Wish Buds would join," Naruto muttered with a whisper. "Would have been more fun with his magic…"

"Too busy ogling that Hyuga chick," Laharl laughed.

"Still…" the blonde sighed. "Well… I think its time to go home."

Laharl agreed, and were jumped down from their position, and they barely landed when suddenly, a hand grabbed the two from behind, pulling their collars so they would stay in place. The two looked back, surprised, and swallowed when they saw their homeroom teacher, Iruka, looking at them with an ugly glare.

* * *

The classroom was glaring at the twins with neutral gazes. The two Uzumakis were really a bunch of troublemakers, and they have been used to this, but the grand scale of their new prank was just so… bold, that some were wondering how the hell the two even had the guts to do that.

Iruka-sensei was in front, shouting at the two. He warned them that if they ever tried to do that again to the Hokage Mountain, they would be sent to Hokage himself to be punished. The mountain, which was supposed to be a monument of the village's leaders, was now decked in cheeky art… orange circles on cheeks, the Fourth's hair was now purple, and the First and Second Hokage look like kabukis, while the third had bright red lips forming a cheek-wide smile.

"But sensei… all we did was improve it…" Naruto muttered before his head was slapped from the back.

"What improvements!?" Iruka demanded. "Making a fool of our Hokage's!?"

"Well… I thought it was artistic…" Naruto continued.

The whole class sighed, along with a brown haired figure in the blackboards, using the eraser to completely wipe out the notes that Iruka wrote.

"After class! Clean-up! I want you both to scrub the mountain until it's free from your vandalism!" Iruka demanded. "And no going home if there is one, even a very tiny little dot of paint left! To make sure, I'll be there to watch you!"

"Oh, come on Iruka-sensei!"

"Injustice! I like you," Laharl declared with a rather toothy lop-sided grin (those who noticed would see small fangs in his grin). "When I'm Overlord, I shall make you my slave! You can massage my great foot three times a day!"

"You want me to add washing the clothes of those chunin who were chasing you? I heard the smell still hasn't come off…" Iruka threatened.

"I didn't know you liked to massage my great foot some more," Laharl replied.

Iruka groaned. Naruto, he could control, but when it came to his brother Laharl, he was a different story. He was as arrogant as Sasuke, but unlike the loner, he was as boisterous as his brother was and had a rather odd attitude by calling himself a Demon Lord. Instead of making good to his threats, or even adding more, he just let the matter drop as he knew it wouldn't faze the boy.

"Sensei…"

Iruka turned as a voice behind him called for him. He was about to ask what the boy behind him wanted when he felt a soft tap on his head, and white powder flowing down freely from the air. His eyes closed, his mouth twitched as it formed a great frown.

"Buds… what are you doing?" Iruka asked.

Buds Uzumaki, though not his real name. Officially, he was listed as Tenshin Uzumaki, but for some reason, never really calls himself that. Even at class, when he introduced himself, he said 'Buds'. The third of the Uzumaki triplets, he was nicknamed Tag-Along. He was as normal as any person was… somewhat introverted, but at times, outspoken, humble, yet proud… he was the middle ground of the Uzumaki Troublemaker Duo. He always attended class, rarely with his brothers when they made trouble, yet always with them during their punishments.

"I'm turning you into a kabuki," Buds muttered in a low and regretting tone.

Iruka sighed. "I know you want to join, but if they'll get help from you, they won't…"

The class gasped as Buds just slapped the black-board eraser on their homeroom teacher's face. Iruka's silence was met with more slaps with the tool, until his face was fully white.

"Can I go home now sensei?" Buds asked with a small smile, knowing full well how his teacher was going to respond. He wasn't disappointed.

"LIKE HELL YOU WILL!"

* * *

After class, the three Uzumaki boys found themselves sitting beside each other, only a wooden plank and a few ropes were supporting them as they were suspended on the side of the Hokage Mountain. Each had a rag with some sort of solvent that would help them clean out the mess the two troublemakers did. The tag-along sighed as he began to regret joining the two.

"You guys cause too much trouble," Buds muttered as he scrubbed the orange paint.

"You need to cause more trouble," Naruto replied back, grinning.

"Put your backs into it!" Laharl shouted. "More scrub, less talk!"

Iruka suddenly appeared behind the boy and gently slapped at the back of his head. "You're the one to talk. You get scrubbing as well!"

Laharl growled, and joined his two brothers and worked with them. The three looked alike in many ways… the only difference would be their attitudes, hair colors and their eye colors. The three worked under the eyes of Iruka, who was satisfied to see the three students working. Hidden from his view, though, the three Uzumaki's were smiling.

"Twelve years…" Buds muttered with a bit of longing. "Usually, its just peanuts… but…"

"Yeah…" Naruto muttered in reply. "It's quite long. Especially when you're home."

"Hmph," Laharl growled. "Why am I here anyway? You two can get all whimsical about being humans again, but I for one dislike every minute of this."

"Hild said you needed this," Buds muttered.

"Hild can kiss my ass," Laharl muttered back.

"Maybe she'll just embrace you instead, eh?" Naruto chuckled, remembering Laharl's utter avoidance of what he and Buds would like to call, sexy, and Hild, for the lack of better term, had sexy all over her. He got a satisfied sound of Laharl being disgusted.

"I'd love to make her choke on a black pretzel one day," Laharl muttered, with revulsion. "Then I can take over her place as supreme ruler of Hell, Multi-verse!"

"Yeah right. And I'm going to be Hokage!" Naruto laughed.

"You know, being back here, its possible now," Buds muttered. "Think about it, Naruto… you could finally fulfill your dream."

"A dream of long ago," Naruto muttered, though his eyes shone slightly at the prospect. He looked at his brother for a moment. "How about you Buds? Laharl's going to be the Supreme Ruler of Hell, I'm gonna be Hokage… how about you?"

"King of England, most probably," Buds grinned, but then, retracted his statement. "No, wait, wait… I shall be a member of Akatsuki!"

"Wha… seriously?" Naruto asked.

"Nah… I'll prolly be some normal chunin… maybe a teacher or something," Buds replied.

"Long term plans," Laharl muttered. "Useless, as we do not know when we're done with this futile second-living."

"Hild said we're staying here until we're 'satisfied'," Buds shrugged. "So, if we have aims, we'd know our chances when this whole thing is going to stop. So… Laharl, if I were you… I'd aim lower."

Laharl just scoffed.

"Still… it was nice of her to do this, eh?" Naruto asked. "Especially after that… war…"

Buds nodded, his lips closed, but his eyes wrought some pain to Naruto. He wished he never mentioned the war, but he was glad his brother was moving on now, as it he who took the heavy burden of waging it.

"So, how was ogling the Hyuga girl? Fun?" Laharl sneered.

"Shut up," Buds muttered, though his cheeks somewhat turned to a slight shade of red.

"Are you gonna ask her out?" Naruto asked seriously.

"When we graduate…" Buds muttered.

"Graduate… eh…?" it was Naruto's turn to keep quiet. "How do we go about this?"

Laharl shrugged, while Buds looked at the blonde Uzumaki, and smiled.

"Your choice."

Naruto nodded. He had already passed this point of his life once, and he thought it would have been rather boring to relive these days again, but now, he wasn't alone. He had his brothers with him… not inside a body shared by three souls, but three different people. Laharl, the arrogant ex-demon lord; Buds, his companion through his first journey to adulthood… the three were so close, they didn't need to pretend they were brothers. In fact, they were family… something Naruto never had growing up the first time.

"Keep working you three!" Iruka shouted, seeing them pause on their work.

"Yes, sensei," Buds muttered.

"Meh… this is boooring!" Naruto muttered as he scrubbed the cheek of the Third harder.

Laharl just raised his middle finger back towards the teacher, but continued to work. Iruka rolled his eyes and after a moment, he made the three stop when he suddenly announced something.

"Alright… when you're done, how about some ramen?" the teacher asked.

"RAMEN! YAY!" was Naruto's reply, something Iruka has expected.

"I want steak, damn it," Laharl's reply was also normal… the boy never did like ramen, and wanted a lot of meat, the more expensive, the better.

"How about dango?" Buds asked, not really his regular reply, Iruka thought, but something he had been hearing from the boy for quite sometime. Usually, he'd love to get a ramen, and would readily reply with a loud 'YES' or 'YAY' as well, but not this time.

"Want to ogle at pineapple-haired snake wench next?" Laharl muttered distastefully.

"Shut up," Buds replied. "You can't even approach her without closing your eyes."

"Well, I suppose your tastes are very diverse. From loli to mature…"

Iruka watched with fascination as Buds threw the towel he had been using at Laharl's face, who then, angrily tried to make a grab at him, knocking the wooden plan they were sitting on off balance. He chuckled as the three Uzumaki boys suddenly yelped and almost fell off the mountain, yet despite the danger, the three hanging on by one of their hands, the two still continued to bicker while Naruto was trying to calm them down.

"HEY! NOT HERE!" Naruto declared.

"Shut up Whiskers! Don't get in the way!" Laharl muttered.

Iruka laughed, and called to them. One word got their attention, and he told them to get back to work, or else he'd never feed them. The three brothers looked at each other, and nodded. After a few more words of bickering, they got back on their plank, and worked hard.

So went another normal day in the Hidden Village of Fire, passing through time as it always did. But unlike the first time around, they had three Uzumakis to deal with… and they weren't going to be satisfied in making the same trip twice.

**To Be Continued…**

* * *

**Next: **

**When Iruka is trouble, who can save him!? For Love, Peace, and World Domination! Uzumaki Sentai! **

* * *

(This chapter has been rewritten)

Author's Notes:

_Confused? You should be. XD But take the story to stride, and enjoy what the story has to offer. Ja ne!_


	2. Chapter 2

**Trinity: Uzumaki Sentai**

* * *

The smell of what Naruto had began to call 'garlic morning' was something that he could never get tired off. Pushing the offending hand of the sleeping Laharl away from his stomach, he spotted Buds in the kitchen preparing breakfast.

His brother had many talents that were not really something ninjas would call useful in combat… one is cooking, which while his repertoire was limited, it was much better than Laharl, who somehow was able to burn rice into black crisps, and Naruto only knew to stoke fire in a campfire to cook fish or stew gathered from the forests.

He only wished Buds knew how to cook ramen. By ramen, Naruto meant real ramen. While instant ramen was not something he'd never say no to, it was nothing compared to real ramen served by a real ramen chef.

His mouth watered at the taste of ramen he had gotten from yesterday, after the whole exhausting clean-up of Hokage mountain. Even after twelve years, Ichiraku was still a great eat; especially it was so long since he had one.

"You up?" Buds had asked from the kitchen.

"Yeah," Naruto replied neutrally, still somewhat sleepy.

"Royal brat?"

"Sleeping like a log," the blonde muttered before he skipped and jumped towards the kitchen, avoiding most of the clutter that was found in their apartment. He liked to keep his apartment clean, but Laharl…

Naruto just erased his thought out of his head.

"Heh… let him," Buds chuckled. "He'll be up and about later… and I can do without his Royal Pain In The Ass Laugh. Ramen?"

The bowl of steaming hot ramen was thrown at him, which Naruto caught so easily with his two fingers. It was instant, of course, but at least Buds tried to make it look different. An attached chopsticks was thrown at his way again, and this time, a kunai, held by the blonde's free hand, was used to split them apart.

He placed his bowl down immediately, and with his newly freed hand, he grabbed in mid-air from his swing, Naruto caught the two pieces of wood delicately, and began to eat.

"Your swing is still slow," Buds muttered.

"This body hasn't been responding as I am used to," Naruto replied.

"A consequence of turning back to a kid, I guess," his brother shrugged. "Don't worry. It's not like we're going to face Orochimaru today."

"Don't remind me…" Naruto shuddered, his memories coming back towards the day of the Forbidden Forest for the second test of the Chunin exam. "I have been thinking…"

"Yes?"

"I'm going to follow how things went before," the blonde muttered. "Knowing that the traitor Mizuki is still here makes me uncomfortable." He paused. He frowned. "Besides… my Bunshin sucks."

For all the difference of this universe, there are things that never ever changed. Naruto never knew what was more frustrating… the fact that his brother, who was not really a trained ninja make a more suitable Bunshin than he did… or the fact that Laharl, who wont even come to classes most of the time, made one without seals!

Yes, granted, the fact that Laharl didn't use ninjutsu (he used some form of demonic energy manipulation that he somehow could use in a human body, which Iruka and the other teachers never really noticed or differentiated from chakra). Yes, also granted the fact that his other brother listened to class more than Naruto didn't make the soreness of losing to both of them any less painful.

Naruto's chakra control had been a sore point for him, and it took him years before he could get some decent control over it, and by that time, he never really needed it anymore so he never perfected it.

He began regretting that now.

Still, the whole thing was impressed to Naruto's mind. Buds, seemingly already had weird stuff happened to him in his long life was almost unfazed by the fact that he was now his own man… or boy, again… a new but not really a very shocking experience for him.

Naruto on the other hand…

Memories came as his mind raced at the implications of how the whole thing started. Hild, the Supreme Ruler of Hell, Multi-Verse, had called it a 'Rewind', a break she had forced upon the Trinity Master (which consisted of Naruto, Laharl, and Buds sharing one core body) to give them time to recover from the rather heavy burden they just carried.

There was a yawn, and Naruto looked over his shoulder to see Laharl grumbling as he took his seat and grabbed food with his spoon, and began to shove it unceremoniously on his eager mouth.

"Training after ten minutes," Buds muttered, making Laharl grimace. Buds looked at him with a knowing frown. "If you don't like it, wake up earlier."

This was a morning routine for all three of them. No matter how peaceful this village seemed to be, Naruto and Buds knew otherwise. When they first could walk, the three would train every morning, conditioning their new bodies. Knowledge of his old life, all the jutsus he had invented during his tenure of walking through universes, they were useless when his body was as responsive as a snail. Learning the seal formation all over again was depressing as it is, but pulling a muscle when doing a roundhouse kick was even worse.

But then again, Naruto knew he wasn't the only one feeling off. Buds, a very able fighter himself, was found tripping on his own feet, overextending his stabs, and more than once, losing grip of his wooden sword. Frustrating, he would admit, but always cheered up when he realized that his magical prowess was still intact, and most of the time, used it as an advantage. Too bad he never had a proper wand. Some of his magics tend to mess up, misfiring at times... one time, it fired back at his face, and he lost one of the morning spars in just seconds.

Laharl, though... he displayed no rust whatsoever in his body or skills. He would overpower the two boys in training, making him perfect to play the lone guy, while Naruto and Buds would always team up to try and take him out first. Too bad Laharl's real skill levels were way below Naruto's or Buds, and he only had raw power to back him up, but even then, trying to beat him was very difficult.

Today though... it was a free-for-all, for today was a very special day: it was the genin graduation examinations.

* * *

Genin Academy, third part of the exam. Naruto Uzumaki, performing Bunshin Technique.

Horribly gone wrong.

"Ehehehe..." Naruto laughed rather nervously when his clones came out... badly. He never messed this terrible before, even when he first done it in his life. Maybe trying to actually fail the test wasn't a good idea.

On the ground, the bunshins of Naruto were cut into pieces, looking up them, shocked like they just came from a horror show. All it needed was a generous amount of tomato sauce, and you got one horrific scene in a slasher film.

"NA-RU-TO!" Iruka looked at the blonde boy with anger. "What the hell is THIS!?"

"Uh... bunshin...?" Naruto replied stupidly.

"FAIL!" Iruka shouted.

"Oh... come on sensei!" Naruto looked at his teacher with a frown.

"Iruka-sensei..."

Naruto looked towards Mizuki with relieved eyes. This was playing out as well as he had hoped. Well, the bunshins weren't really part of his plans... from sickly to somehow... apparently, dead. He put up his pleading eyes, and prayed that is what he was doing the first time around; after all, he did need this...

"His brothers have passed... maybe we ought to make an exception to this case. After all... he did do a..." Mizuki looked again towards Naruto, and then towards his bunshins... and then just shook his head. "Nevermind... but you get what I am saying, right?"

"Mizuki-sensei, the fact that his brothers passed will do nothing to condone this..." Iruka looked at the bunshins, and shook his own head. He looked at Naruto with a small regretting frown. "I'm sorry, Naruto... but... I can't let you pass."

"Yes!" Naruto celebrated, pumping his hand up and down the air knowing that his little ploy worked. It was different... but worked nonetheless, but then, he suddenly remembered where he was.

Iruka and Mizuki both looked at the boy with rather wide eyes at his reaction. This was actually a first they ever got from failing a student. Usually, it was tears, running out, and some death threats by a few parents, but... a celebration?

"Uh... I mean..." Naruto feigned ignorance. "So... I passed...?"

Iruka blinked. "I said you failed."

"Nah-uh!" Naruto muttered, shaking his head. "You said you'd let me pass."

"I said I can't let you pass," Iruka replied calmly.

Naruto and Iruka looked at each other, and with great acting the blonde had been practicing since the morning after the spar with his brothers, he made a pained face filled with resentment, and dashed out of the door, covering his eyes with one of his arms.

"SCREW THIS!" he shouted as he made his exit, and went straight towards his brothers, who were waiting for him downstairs, outside the academy. Passing through children celebrating with their parents, he remembered the pain he had felt before, watching kids show off their shiny new forehead protectors. Now, he felt foreign to the feeling, for waiting for him outside, was in fact, his family.

"Well?" Laharl asked with curious look. His forehead protector was tied around his neck loosely, almost similar to Hinata, while Buds put his left wrist, his wooden sword at his back.

Naruto gave the thumbs up. Everything was going according to plan.

* * *

That night, the poor Hokage (and Laharl) had received double whammy hits of Naruto's patented and still quite effective Sexy no Jutsu, one done by yours truly, and the other by Buds who was now giggling like an idiot.

"I never get tired of it," he muttered. "It's so damn erotic..."

Laharl sighed, the large forbidden scroll strapped at his back. He hated that technique... hated every aspect of it, from the well-formed cups to the sleek curve lines of their legs to the... he shuddered.

"Can't you turn to something... I don't know, flat?" he asked, making the other two stare at him. "What?"

"You're weird," Buds declared.

"Says you," Laharl muttered. "Bet you wouldn't mind if Naruto or yourself transform into that Hyuga chick, naked."

"Shut up," Buds muttered, slightly blushing again.

"We're here," Naruto called, pointing towards the area where they were supposed to meet Mizuki. The three boys jumped from branch to branch, until finally, Naruto fell from the high trees to the ground below, followed by the two.

"If I remember correctly, I spent the whole time studying and trying to do the Kage Bunshin..."

The place was where Mizuki had told Naruto to meet; it was a clearing in the forest. Landing near the small supply shack, the blonde and his two brothers began to untie the small binding closing the scroll, and unrolled it.

"Still need a quick read on how?" Buds asked. "After all... you have been going about twelve years without using it..."

"Nah... look..." Naruto then began forming the seals in his hands. A few seconds later, there were now six blondes surrounding the three, each of them waving, smiling, and patting the original Naruto's back appreciatively. "Kami, I miss doing this... I can finally go all out in our spars..."

"Your seal formation is still slow," Buds muttered, making the blonde narrow his eyes at his brother.

"Oh come on..." Naruto frowned. Buds chuckled and exclaimed it was nothing but a joke.

Fore safety reasons, Naruto had been forced to abandon his most favorite technique, the Kage Bunshin, and his other much more advanced jutsu he had invented. Able to know the seals, and perform the forbidden technique would raise too many questions of his knowledge of obtaining it. Worse case scenario, he might be branded as a spy and shoved into an interrogation room...

Or so Buds said. But then, that didn't stop him from using his earth elemental magic, and passing them off as Earth Style Techniques.

_Ass_, Naruto thought. _He prolly didn't want to face hundreds of me..._

Though what Buds said did have merits, which was why Naruto patiently waited until the graduation, but the wait had cost him his patience and his efficiency with the seals. He could do the Kage Bunshin in less than a second before... now he'd be going to have to spend days to finally even make it less than two.

"While we're at it, lets look at other techniques," Buds suddenly declared, and began to unroll the scroll.

"I have no need for useless human techniques," Laharl declared.

"Oh, look... there's one here that allows you to make any sexy females to flat chested ones..."

"Where!?" and the squinty-eyed Uzumaki joined in. "Liar!" he muttered after he took a careful look, and punched Buds in the arm, but didn't stop looking afterwards.

Naruto snorted at how easily Buds was able to make Laharl get into the whole 'lets all look at the scroll' bit, and joined himself. As a kid, he didn't really find anything other than the Kage Bunshin technique useful... quite truthfully, the only reason why he chose Kage Bunshin was because it had the word Bunshin in it... and since at that time, he wanted to be Hokage, he thought that this Bunshin technique is what Kages would use, hence the name.

"Wow... look at this..." Buds pointed at one of exotic sounding techniques in the scroll. "Sheesh... what the hell. Look at that hand-seal list... who the hell has time to even get this attack out!?"

"Takes practice," Naruto muttered. He recognized some of the techniques, though not by name, just by description. "Hey... look at this..."

It seemed the Forbidden Scroll was not only a list of jutsus but also was displaying an obscure branch of ninjutsu, mainly, the blood seals.

Blood Seals are probably one of the most powerful techniques at a ninja's disposal, though rarely used because it usually takes preparation and a lot of planning. Most simple and most used Blood Seals would be summoning techniques, either using animal familiars, like Toads of Jiraiya or even weapon storage scrolls, like the ones that Tenten's family would use.

Even the demon-sealing techniques were Blood Seals.

"Hey... Naruto... you better come look at this..."

Buds suddenly showed something that made Naruto blink. At almost the very end of the scroll was a whole map of the Fire Country, though unlike most of the general maps sold in the village, this particular one was showing a place that wasn't present in those. Somewhere near the village, it seems, there was a structural cave, large enough to cover almost half of the forests of the hidden village.

It was aptly named '**Kyubi's Lair**'.

Naruto immediately shoved Laharl out of the way, much to the squinty-eyed Uzumaki's complaints, and stared at the map, looking at it thoroughly. He checked the magnification, then used his kunai to take a few measurements.

"This... this is amazing," Naruto muttered. "East of the village... about two days travel back to back... though I think we can squeeze it to less one... guys..." he looked towards his brothers. "We have to-"

Cut off by a solid kick in the face, the blonde Uzumaki flew towards the tree, slamming it hard. Laharl, with his extended foot out, looked at the Naruto with his narrowed eyes and lopsided grin.

"What the hell!?" Naruto shouted, rubbing his cheek. "What... the... hell!?"

"That's for shoving the great Laharl!"

"Great my ass!" Naruto then lounged for the purple-haired Uzumaki, and the two rolled on the ground, trying to punch each other's lights out.

"You guys..." Buds muttered in annoyance, now rolling the big scroll to close. He had barely finished tying the scroll when he was kicked from behind. It didn't take long before he joined in the fray, and began smacking Naruto's and Laharl's faces with open palms.

And that's how Iruka found them. Buds had bowed out earlier, and was lying down the ground, while Laharl had Naruto on a headlock, while the blonde was apparently trying to escape it.

"Uzumakis..." Iruka growled.

Laharl and Naruto paused. Buds' head rose from its position, and all three of them gave him a rather nervous smile.

"Yare yare..." the brown haired boy spoke.

"Ehehe... you found me..." Naruto muttered. He squeezed his head, trying to remember what he was supposed to say next. "I only had time to get one technique..."

"Technique?" Iruka asked, looking at the three brothers. Did they even know how much trouble they were in?

"Yeah... Mizuki-sensei said if I showed you one technique from this scroll, you'd let me pass!" the blonde declared.

"Mizuki...?" Iruka asked, his eyes widening.

"Yeah... he told me about the scroll, about this place..." Naruto continued.

"We helped," Buds muttered, raising his hands, having a somewhat proud smile. Laharl just rolled his eyes.

Iruka's thoughts were on Mizuki, and the implications Naruto raised. Suddenly, he felt a killing intent, and automatically pushed Naruto and Laharl away from him as a flurry of kunais came at him. It might have killed an unskilled genin, but Iruka was able to deflect most of the lethal ones away, only receiving a few scratches in his arms and legs... but he was too slow to deflect one, which was now stuck on his knee. And he was also stuck on the shack wall as one of the kunai had gotten a hold of his shirt, pinning him there.

"Iruka-sensei!" Naruto declared, looking at his teacher worriedly. He was about to approach him when another flurry of kunai came at him, and the blonde boy dodged at the last second. He looked up from where the weapons were being thrown from, and saw Mizuki looking down on them with a rather evil stare. "Mizuki-sensei...?"

Mizuki laughed. "Impressive that you found him... Iruka..."

"Damn you... Mizuki..." Iruka declared, looking towards the traitorous teacher.

"Wha... what's going on...?" Buds muttered, standing up, looking towards his two teachers. On his back was the Forbidden Scroll.

"Tenshin... give me the scroll..." Mizuki called.

"Oi... don't call me that," Buds muttered, his forehead twitching.

Iruka breathed deeply as he forced the kunai out of his thigh. The sharp pain made him growl in pain, but kept himself steady. He looked towards the Uzumaki brothers.

"Buds... don't give him the scroll... even if you die!" he declared seriously. "That scroll is filled with techniques that are forbidden within it! Mizuki was using you to steal it for himself..."

"That is harsh, Iruka... especially coming from you," Mizuki laughed. "You're also afraid that those three would have it too... right Iruka?"

The Uzumakis looked towards Iruka who stared at the other teacher hard. He looked towards the three boys, who were now standing together. "Don't be fooled by him! Get out of here! Run!"

"Uzumakis... do you want to know the truth?" Mizuki declared.

"Mizuki! Don't!" the wounded teacher growled helplessly, knowing full well what the traitor was about to say.

"There was a rule that was created twelve years ago... a rule that was not supposed to be mentioned to you..."

"W... what rule?" Naruto asked, looking confused.

"A rule that no one was supposed to talk about you three being the Demon Fox!"

"Wha... what?" Buds muttered, looking shocked.

"Che..." Laharl growled.

"You three... are three parts of the Demon Fox... who destroyed this village many years ago!" Mizuki continued.

"Stop it... MIZUKI!" Iruka shouted, taking out the offending kunai pinning him on the wall.

"Why do you think you three were never adopted… the hateful glares you received from everybody? Did you three not think it was so odd that somehow the whole village seemed to hate you?" and the traitorous teacher laughed again. "Now you know… you three… demons! No one will acknowledge you! Even Iruka hates you!"

The Uzumaki brothers looked towards Iruka, who looked back at them with some regret. The teacher then recalled the Third Hokage talking to him about the brothers.

"_Iruka… those three never really received a parent's love… they may act tough, but other than themselves, they are all alone." _

"DIE, UZUMAKIS!"

Iruka's eyes gleamed as he watched in horror as Mizuki sent three large shurikens on the brothers' ways, and acted instinctually. Jumping in front of them, he kicked one of the shurikens out of the way… but with his injuries, he couldn't muster enough power to do anything for the last two.

Iruka felt the second tear through his arm, gashing it deeply, forcing him to the left turning him around. He saw the three brothers looking at him with shock, awe… and respect. Especially Naruto, whose eyes shone into tears as tears threatened to pour down.

The next moment, he didn't know what happened. Iruka expected the third shuriken to come and stab him at his back, but instead, he heard a grunt and the sound of wood breaking apart.

"Tch…" Buds muttered, who was now behind Iruka. In his hand was a splintered piece of wood, his wooden sword he always carried with him. He threw it away. "There goes my weapon…"

Laharl looked towards Iruka with a glint in his eyes. "Heh… you're worthy to become my subordinate when I rule Hell."

Laharl began to walk towards Buds, much to Iruka's shock.

"Laharl… wait!" Iruka muttered, extending his hand to stop the boy from moving when Naruto gently grabbed his arm. The older man looked at the boy, surprised. "Naruto…?"

"Sensei… thank you," the blonde boy stated. "But… we'll take care of it from here."

Naruto moved away from Iruka's reach, and joined his two brothers.

"Satisfied?" Buds asked, not looking at his blonde brother.

"Yes…" Naruto closed his eyes. "Iruka-sensei… hasn't changed."

"Stupid," Laharl grinned. "This is your past. He'd never change. You did."

"Yeah…" and Naruto opened his eyes, and glared at Mizuki. "Let's kick some ass."

The traitor looked at the three, and laughed out louder than he ever did in his whole life. "You little punks!" he shouted, gleefully. "You think you three useless ninjas can beat me!?"

"The way of the ninja is filled with peril!" Naruto declared, his hand going for his pockets. Mizuki took a step back, wondering what Naruto was planning, only to pause in wonderment when he extracted a rather colorful yellow eye mask and wore it. "For my precious people, I shall protect them!"

"For freedom, justice and independence, I stand by my loved ones through thick and thin!" Buds declared, grabbing out a brown eye mask, almost similar to Naruto's and wore it as well. Mizuki began to look more confused.

"For world domination, and just plainly because I dislike you…" Laharl grabbed out a purple eye mask, and wore it as well. "Uzumaki Purple!"

"Uzumaki Brown!" Buds declared.

"Uzumaki Yellow!" Naruto shouted.

"WE ARE…!" and they suddenly posed… "UZUMAKI SENTAI!"

Iruka and Mizuki blinked. The Third Hokage, who had been watching with his crystal ball, also blinked. They all thought of the same thing.

"_What the hell…?"_

Mizuki frowned. "You kids… are you underestimating me!? YAAAHHH!" and he shouted the last bit as he charged towards the three, grabbing two kunais, one each hand, as he went for them, intent to kill, when he saw a purple blur suddenly appear in front of him.

"Cause you took my quota for evil laughs…" Laharl suddenly declared as his foot rose up from his position… "Take this! Purple NUTCRACKER!"

A small bell was heard when the kick connected to Mizuki's crotch, and stopped him cold on his tracks. He didn't know what else happened but a brown blur suddenly approached him with a wooden stick.

"You lack loyalty, and are too greedy! Take my righteous LAUNCHER!" Buds declared, hitting Mizuki in the chin with a rising blade slash, launching the teacher in the air.

Mizuki groaned as he found himself helpless in the air, and could only watch as Buds threw his stick in the air, transforming to Naruto, who then began forming seals.

"Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!" Naruto declared, and thirteen copies of him suddenly appeared from his level. "And because you hurt Iruka-sensei… I shall pay it back to you a thousand times!"

Mizuki screamed as the clones then kicked him back down to the ground, and completed their attack by raining down on his fallen body with fourteen punches, all coming at the same time, synchronized.

Iruka watched with awe as the whole ground seemed to shake and explode as the fourteen Narutos came down at once, each of their fist hitting Mizuki. He felt sorry for the traitor for the moment, but couldn't look away as Naruto finally came between his waiting brothers, and posed again.

"Repent your actions now that you received the patented…"

"Uzumaki…!"

"Sentai…!"

"COMBO!"

Iruka clapped as the three, without abash, declared the last word together. The three brothers, hearing the clap, looked towards Iruka. Naruto scratched the back of his head rather bashfully, while Buds had that knowing smile he usually had when he answered something in class correctly. Laharl was laughing out loud.

"MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

"I still hate that laugh," Naruto declared, removing his mask.

Laharl just gave Naruto the finger as he removed his. "Deal with it, Whiskers!"

"Heh… still… not bad for the first appearance of the Uzumaki Rangers, eh?" Buds chuckled as he also removed his.

Naruto grinned. It was a rather quickly formed plan, but it came out better than he expected. Even Laharl seemed to enjoy himself, being the most vocal critic of this, according to his words, 'the most stupid plan he ever heard about in a thousand years'.

The three then looked towards Mizuki, who was now sporting many bruises, and still holding on to his crotch.

"Did we overdo it?" Buds asked.

"Kinda…" Naruto replied. "But whatever! Iruka-sensei!"

Naruto dashed towards his injured teacher, followed by his two brothers. The three then helped him lean on the shack wall, where he was told to rest.

"I'll get help," Buds declared.

"I'm joining," Laharl muttered, and the two brothers jumped towards the trees and dashed away, leaving Naruto and Iruka alone.

"Ne, ne, whatcha think of my new technique?" Naruto asked, smiling widely. "Cool eh!"

"Yeah… it is," Iruka stated honestly. He looked towards the blonde's blue eyes, and smiled warmly. "Hey… Naruto… close your eyes for a minute, would you?"

When Buds and Laharl came back with the ANBU and the Hokage on the toll, Naruto was displaying his new forehead protector proudly towards his two brothers. Laharl looked unimpressed, though Buds was a bit more appreciative.

Iruka and Third Hokage looked as the Uzumaki brothers celebrated together (which meant Naruto and Laharl argued with each other while Buds tried to nervously separate the two), and chuckled. They had the same thoughts on their head as they watched the three together, the sun rising towards the sky, illuminating the metal parts of their protectors. They were proud.

The Uzumaki brothers paused to watch the whole forest sparkle as rays of sun began to invade their senses. They looked at each other and smiled.

_Watch out Konoha… here we come! _they thought.

**To Be Continued**

* * *

**Next: **

**Travel around the Hidden Village of Fire, and see the sights, as Dr. Naruto 'Indiana' Uzumaki and his two brothers explore the ruins known as Kyubi's Lair! **

* * *

(This chapter has been rewritten)

Author's Notes: 

_As you can see, the whole story is focused more on comedy and parody than seriousness, though… I doubt I can abandon seriousness. Enjoy! _


	3. Chapter 3

**The Uzumaki Brothers and the Kyubi's Lair**

* * *

Naruto looked towards the numerous gate guards with a glare. Their looming size, arms crossed around their chest blocked him and his brothers from exiting the hidden village.

"Steady men… steady…" Buds muttered as he looked at the line formation… formation of Naruto clones, each armed with different weapons.

In the middle of the hidden village of Fire Country, Konoha was under war-like situation. The streets were abandoned, all villagers staying in their homes… ninjas, ranging from Chunin to Jounin ranks were waiting beside the gates, looking on as a massive orange army was holding its position on the town square. The blonde hair from such an amassing group of forces reflected the sun as it passed overhead…

Laharl looked towards the high grounds, the ceilings of one particular building, to see Naruto looking beyond their position, towards the gates. He then looked towards Buds who was inspecting the army, keeping morale, and calm.

Suddenly, the warning horn sounded.

"General Laharl, a Konoha ninja is coming in!" a worried sounding Naruto clone declared from another ceiling. "He's carrying a neutral flag!"

"Probably a negotiator," Laharl muttered.

Naruto jumped towards the ground, joining his squinty-eyed brother, while at the same time, Buds also joined in. The three then walked forward, meeting the incoming shinobi.

* * *

Asuma Sarutobi sighed as he waved the flag while wondering what the hell was going on. He had been preparing his final test with the genin team he was going to be assigned with when this pops out of nowhere.

It started at yesterday at 1200 hours, where there was a certain incident involving Uzumakis wanting to go out of the village. According to the rules of Konoha, unless they were given permission, or under a watchful eye of a guardian, no genin or young civilians were allowed to go explore out on their own.

Most of the jounin heard the incident, as Naruto Uzumaki, the Prankster, seemed to make a scene out of it, insulting the guards, and threatened to castrate them with a rusted kunai, while Laharl, the Trickster, told them they were about to experience what it felt like to be a Prinny.

Whatever that meant.

Of course, the guards looked on the puny twelve year olds with faint interest, and just rejected their passage. However, that wasn't the end of it. At 1300 hours of that day, the two Uzumaki troublemakers went towards the Hokage, who asked him free passage. Asked why they want to leave the village, Naruto declared…

"I have to do something important."

When asked what was that important thing, he just replied…

"Something really important."

Hokage, shaking his head, rejected their offer, and made them leave his office. Now… next day, at 0600 hours, a massive group of Narutos marching towards the town square surprised the whole village into hiding. Most wondered what was going on, pondering what scheme did those demon brats have now. The younger ones, the ones in Naruto's class, though, were more or less sleeping at their homes, enjoying their vacation before Orientation Day.

The Hokage, hearing the army inside the village, quickly amassed a large amount of guards to safeguard the gates, and now, back to the present, this is where everyone was standing. Asuma was sent as a negotiator, asked to convince the Uzumaki brothers to stop this… silliness.

Naruto, front and center, wore his orange jumpsuit, and odd facial camouflage… his face was painted white and accentuated with red stripes going around his face towards his nose, the very same design he used in his picture for the Ninja Registration Form.

Laharl was on his left, wearing what Asuma could only describe as a nice looking piece of leather armor, accented in purple colors, and with a red scarf.

Buds was on the right, wearing a hakama, loosened somewhat on the sleeves, his wooden sword hanging from his waist; his hair tied at the back, forming a small pigtail. He looked like some samurai.

The two parties looked at each other, greeting each other with a slight nod.

"Uzumakis," Asuma began slowly, wondering what to say next. "Hokage-sama is asking you withdraw. He doesn't want to make an incident out of this… just get back to your apartment, and just wait until your orientation and form the three-man team. Then you can go out as you need…"

"Jounin-san," Naruto declared suddenly, cutting the older man off. "I am General Naruto. I demand safe passage to the outside. Do as I say, and I shall spare your men. If not… all of you will die."

Asuma blinked.

"Uh…" he muttered a bit, trying to find his voice. "You do know that disobeying the Hokage will have its consequences, right?"

"Heh," Laharl muttered, then suddenly laughed. "Hokage? You are talking to an Overlord! What puny human would have authority over me!?"

Asuma shook his head. Seemed it was pointless to talk to them… he was about to turn and go when he heard the third Uzumaki suddenly speak to him.

"Before you go, you must tell the representative of your guards that before he can accept our terms, he must come forth and present himself to our army," Buds muttered. "He will then bend his head to his knees… and kiss his own ass."

Asuma's eyes narrowed, and a wrought smile was brought on his face. He performed a seal with his hand, and disappeared on wisp of smoke, leaving the three Uzumaki brothers to walk back towards their army of clones.

* * *

Ebisu, the appointed leader of the gate guardian force welcomed Asuma as he came back from negotiations.

"Well… how did it go?" the special jounin asked the other.

"Well… the Uzumakis say give up, and he'll spare us," Asuma related. "If you don't… he'll kill us."

The ninjas around then chuckled loudly and appreciatively. How would three genins think of trying to get past them? Sure, they were using Kage Bunshin, but even then, those were relatively useless as they would die after getting hit once.

"Idiots…" Ebisu growled. He was still sore about Naruto using the Harem no Jutsu against him yesterday after he had found his care, Konohomaru, the Third Hokage's grandson, in the demon boy's company.

"They also said that once we decide to give up… you, Ebisu, would have to walk in front of their army, put your head between your legs, and kiss your own ass."

Ebisu growled. Those bastards!

* * *

Back at Naruto's camp, the self-named Generals, Naruto, Laharl, and Buds got to their positions, and watched as the group of ninjas in front of them seemed to tense up. They could imagine in there, Ebisu, who they saw was leading the whole group, steaming and cursing.

"UZUMAKIS!" Naruto shouted, calling attention towards the clones, who gave him their full attention. "I see in all of you, the very same fear that would take the heart of me… some of you will live… most, and probably all of you will die…

"But know this!" he continued passionately. "There will be an age where the courage of men fail, but it is not this day! There will also be a time where ramen will be terrible, its broth losing its flavor and its noodles losing its texture… but it is not this day! Today will be the day, where your children, and your children's children will look back, and they will not see cowards who tucked tail and run, but men, of valor!"

"Of HONOR!" Buds declared as well, raising his wooden sword.

"And of Strength!" Naruto nodded as he continued. "They may take our lives… but… they'll never take… OUR FREEDOM!"

"HOO! HOO! HOO! HOO!"

The village was shaking as the army of Narutos began to psyche themselves out, stomping their right foot down in synchrony.

"Keep your eyes on the prize, boys," Laharl declared, grabbing out a few daggers. "Tonight… we will dine… IN HELL!"

All of them shouted, and all at once, charged in, running, shouting towards the gates. In front, the three Uzumaki brothers, led the thousand clone army against the might of the more experienced, and better skilled ninjas.

All of them fought like warriors. All of them fought like Uzumakis.

* * *

Laharl was breathing deeply, his hand shaking as he had lost grip of one of his daggers. Behind him were Naruto, who was still standing strong, while Buds keeled, being supported by his wooden sword.

"Bastards…" he muttered as he spat on the ground.

The jounins and chunins that surrounded them looked with rather grim smiles. All of them were dirty, somewhat beaten, and tired. They had to use almost all of their energy just to stop what seemed like endless numbers of Narutos who just came charging in without hesitation. The numbers were almost too overwhelming, even though dispatched easily… and all that was left was the three 'Generals'.

"Hehe… this is tough," Naruto muttered, his hand going for his kunai. He looked towards his other brother, struggling to get up. "You okay?"

"Yeah…" Buds muttered as he stood up. He raised his sword to his level, and looked towards the ninjas surrounding them. "How are you two?"

"Fine…" Laharl answered.

"Doing better than expected," Naruto replied as well. "Heh… heh… Laharl… Buds… it's been an honor to meet you."

The two nodded… and once again, without pause, charged towards their enemies. Ebisu looked from the frontlines, watched as Naruto charged towards his unit, and signaled all of them to prepare kunais to throw. They weren't ordered to kill the Uzumakis, but they were ordered to stop them in any means possible.

"FIRE!" he barked the order, and the jounins and chunins suddenly threw their kunais.

Laharl shouted as he was the one that was hit first, on the arm, and to everyone's surprise, he exploded into a puff of smoke. Naruto was hit next, and also disappeared to a puff of smoke. Buds, who somehow managed to deflect most of the kunais with his wooden sword was the last one to get hit… and the last one to blow in a puff of smoke, leaving everyone around the area confused to what was going on.

* * *

Naruto suddenly looked up blankly, clutching his head. He moaned slightly as the memories of the Thousand Uzumakis battled against the Jounins. The last of all of the clones finally fell.

Laharl and Buds looked back at him, wondering why he suddenly stopped moving.

"Ugh... never doing that again," the blonde muttered as his brain suddenly began to experience thousands of deaths in almost an instant.

"Never do again, what?" Buds asked.

"Nothing," Naruto smiled nervously, and caught up with the two. "Just... uh... excited! Yup! We can finally see Kyubi-nesan's home!"

Trinity Master, who is Naruto, Laharl and Buds sharing one core body had never came to be if it wasn't for one most significant person in Naruto's life. During his early years, as written in the Uzumaki Naruto Ninja Chronicles, there were two beings who had supported the blonde ninja during his growth... Buds, his brother, and the other was Kyubi, who he lovingly called sister.

Those who are wondering where Laharl was... well... it's complicated.

Naruto was excited when he found out about this place because of one thing... he had never seen his Fox sister for a very long time. The moment the Trinity Master was finally born, Kyubi had moved on out of the cage, giving Naruto only a tearful goodbye.

She never appeared again.

The blonde ninja had fervently been hopeful for the first five years of the Rewind to see his sister once again. However, no matter how much he meditated, no matter how deep he tried to delve in his mind and soul, all he could see inside him was a cage, where inside, was three spheres of light spinning round and round.

He wasn't the only one though. Buds also claimed that he could see the very same cage and three spheres as well, though his moved into a triangle. Laharl claimed that his was just bouncing around the cage, and sometimes exploding like fireworks, only to reform and bounce away.

What would they find in Kyubi's lair? The anticipation was building as the three continued on their journey, one jump at a time.

"You sure ol' man Hokage agreed we could go out?" Buds asked suddenly.

Naruto and Laharl looked at each other worriedly.

"Of course!" Naruto lied convincingly.

"He was quite agreeable about it too," Laharl stated.

Yes, if telling the two, point-blank, that he had no time to waste with silly requests was agreeable, then sure.

Buds was never told of the whole 'Army of Uzumaki' ploy because he would never have agreed to it. He would have either asked the two brothers to think of something else, or would just tell them to wait until they got into their teams.

Naruto wouldn't hear of it.

Probably the hardest part was trying to get out with Buds still doubtful that they were given permission. Thanks to the army at town square gunning for the main South Gate, almost all the guards and ninjas assigned to stop the army have, under Ebisu's leadership, grouped most of them together to stop anyone from getting through there. Because of that, the East Gate was free from any roaming guards, save from one Chunin who was fed earlier with a drug that induced loose bowel movement.

What greeted the three Uzumakis in the East Gate were wide-open spaces, where they hurried out to Konoha, and towards Kyubi's Lair.

According to the map, it was two days travel, though those calculations were geared towards civilians, or escorts with wagons. Naruto knew that he and his two brothers would have made the trip there and back in a less than a day, or at most, a full one if they take consideration the time they'd use to explore the lair.

They had been following a road, going East of Konoha, but as the approached the area where the map indicated, it slowly dwindled until all that was left was forestry. Thankfully, there were no hostiles, and so it was smooth sailing until they finally arrived into...

"Kyubi's Lair..." Naruto stated in awe as he stopped to take a look at it.

It was a rather large cave at the base of a mountain, sealed off with a rope in the entrance, tied with papers written in Blood Seals. Naruto looked towards his brothers, who were still in amazement of what they saw.

"I forgot how... big... she actually was..." Buds muttered.

Buds had seen her mostly in her human form, as he originally, sealed and trapped inside Naruto, alone with the Kyubi. Their first encounter wasn't that great... she tried to bash his head in only to realize it was futile as he never really got hurt. His last memory of her was when he overpowered the seal, took over Naruto's body, and beat the crap out of Sasuke, who had been, at that time, escaping to get to Orochimaru. **(1)**

"Well...?" Laharl muttered, looking annoyed. "We going or what?"

"Uh... well..." Naruto looked carefully at the Blood Seals. It seemed like a simple sealing technique, but neither really specializing on that branch of ninjutsu, he had no idea what else it was supposed to do. "I have no idea what Seals were used here for... other than sealing... but sealing against what?"

"Trespassers, maybe?" Laharl asked, only to suddenly be punted from behind, pushing him towards the entrance, and his legs tripping over the rope.

Naruto chuckled appreciatively when he saw his brother's extended foot. "Nice," he declared.

"Well, he was in a hurry," Buds replied back with his own grin, only to find two sandals kicking his face, sending him to a tree.

Laharl had a somewhat evil grin as he landed to the ground from his attack. Buds himself looked somewhat shaken, but relatively unharmed.

"Ow... ow... ow... damnit! That was overboard!" Buds shouted.

"What's the matter? Little Tenshin can't take a hit?" Laharl mocked with a laugh.

"I'm gonna kick your ass you little..."

"Wait, wait, wait!" Naruto came between them. "This isn't the time!"

"Tch," Buds muttered, still seething that Laharl had called him in that name. "Well... at least we know we can enter and exit without problem..."

"Yeah," Laharl growled. He supposed that Buds did them a favor when he kicked him over the entrance, confirming that they could indeed enter and exit through the blood seals. It didn't make him feel better that he was used as a guinea pig. Overlords are never used as guinea pigs!

"Alright... now that it's over... lets go!" Naruto declared loudly and the three Uzumakis nodded, and entered the entrance of the cave, not spotting a sign that was earlier hidden in the shrubbery. When the wind kicked in, it read:

**Warning! Do not Enter! **

* * *

The whole place was pitch black, and if it wasn't for Buds, who had made the three brothers prepare at least something that would help them explore anything in the ruins. He packed three bags containing some chakra torches (which one end would ignite with a small fire when given enough chakra), rations, rope, numerous small glass spheres and even a compass.

Naruto, as much as he appreciated his brother's boy-scout like tendency, was wondering why Buds then began to tell him to wear a wide brimmed fedora hat, and hold on to a ten-foot bullwhip. While the hat was comfortable enough, and the bullwhip wouldn't be much of a hassle, but he still wondered what the heck his brother was thinking.

He also began to hum a rather odd but catchy tune during the entire trip, grating a few nerves. It wasn't until Laharl demanded what the hell he was humming did Buds look at them like they were a bunch of idiots.

"You guys never seen Indiana Jones?" he asked. When they shook their heads, Buds could only sigh. "I don't know you two anymore."

Everything was dropped as the three Uzumakis then began their exploration of the dark labyrinth of the cave. Even with their extra light source, darkness seemed to enclose around them, and each area was very much similar to the next.

It was as if they were not even moving at all.

Thankfully, the glass spheres came useful as they dropped them, and was going to be used as a guide to lead them back to the exit, especially when the path suddenly began to curl around like a snake.

When there were forks on the road, Naruto would send his Kage Bunshins to other paths, while the Uzumaki brothers would continue on their quest to explore the lair. Sometimes, they would meet Naruto's clones, surprised that the paths interconnected somehow.

"Maybe the paths are just an illusion... and all goes to one place?" Laharl suggested.

"No... some of my clones had landed on dead-ends," Naruto tapped his head. "Told them to kill themselves if they reached one."

"Nice thinking," Buds stated appreciatively.

"Do we do the same if we, ourselves, get to a dead end?" Laharl asked with a small sneer.

"Don't jinx it, please..." Naruto muttered, rolling his eyes.

Buds chuckled, but stopped when he saw what was up ahead... and groaned. "Too late... he jinxed it."

Naruto groaned himself as the three brothers found them selves at a dead-end. He shone the light at the surroundings, trying to see if they missed a small passage or a way up in their paths, but no luck. All they had was a wall of rock, and, strangely, a pink teddy bear.

"Heh... cute," Naruto declared as he approached the stuffed toy. "Kinda odd to find something like this here, in Kyubi's lair."

"Wouldn't be surprised if by some odd taste that this doll was Kyubi's until she grew out of it," Laharl smirked.

The image of the foxy and well endowed Kyubi in her human form, now shrunken, flat-chested, wearing a sunny smile as she carried a stuffed teddy bear made Naruto and Buds laugh out so loud that Laharl looked surprised at the reaction.

"Hahahahaha! Kyubi's Bear!" Buds declared.

"Oh, she'd kill us if she knew we were laughing!" Naruto stated, also laughing hard.

"You think Kyubi was ever that... young?"

The two snorted once again, breaking to laughter, much to Laharl's annoyance.

"What? Let me in on the joke already," he demanded.

The two may or may not have filled the ex-Overlord in, but a creepy feeling had crept into the area. The three Uzumakis became alert as they heard a somewhat creepy giggle echoing around the cavern.

Then… a female voice called from the dark.

"_Have you come to play with me?" _

Alert, nervous, and surprised, the Uzumaki brothers suddenly formed a small triangle, their backs facing each other, touching, forming a triangular defensive position.

"Who's there!?" Naruto demanded, his mind going somewhat blank. He couldn't feel anyone's presence here. From what he could tell, Buds and Laharl was also trying to feel their way around, trying to detect where the voice was coming from.

There was another giggle.

"_Don't be afraid..." _

"Where are you!?" Laharl demanded.

"_Here..." _

Naruto, Laharl, and Buds' eyes went wide, as the whisper came right behind them. They looked over their shoulder... between their formation, there was a transparent girl with long purple hair looking at them.

She giggled.

They screamed.

* * *

In the labyrinth, the darkness of the cave walls were illuminated when the three Uzumaki brothers ran like chickens about to lose their heads, their mouths gaped open, screaming. Following them was a pink teddy bear, seemingly walking towards them with rather surprising speed.

"Ghosts!" Naruto declared after he gave out his final scream.

"Yeah, we know, Mr. Obvious!" Buds declared with impatience, trying to keep up with the other two. "Now just shut up and run!"

Laharl stayed quiet, obviously very embarrassed to be in this predicament. Normally, he wouldn't be afraid of such weak immaterial beings. Back then, the Trinity Master would just use their fists or their scalpels to take care of such... weaklings. But they were now humans; no demonic blood in their veins, no spiritually charged scalpels, no anything.

Laharl looked behind him and his face went straight as he saw the teddy bear now running at them. His legs then began moving faster than they ever did before, leaving the other two brothers to look at him from behind.

"_Come baaack..." _

Buds and Nartuo ran faster, catching up with their overtaking brother soon enough, more panicky than ever.

"Damnit, you two!" Laharl exclaimed. "Can't you guys think of anything!?"

"You're the great Overlord! You tell us!" Naruto countered.

"Well, if you haven't noticed... I'm in a stinking human body!" Laharl declared back. "There must be some jutsu you know that can harm some ghost!"

"No need..." Buds suddenly declared. The two looked at him as the calm brother slowed his pace until he completely stopped to his tracks, and turned his back on his brothers and faced where the bear was.

"Buds...?" Naruto asked, confused, and was about to go to him when he shoved his hands, motioning them to stop approaching him.

"Naruto, Laharl... go," Buds muttered in a serious tone. "I'll try to stop her... go!"

Question of his plans were squashed when Laharl grabbed Naruto's hand and forced the blonde Uzumaki to run. Protests fell on the ex-Overlord's deaf ears.

"Laharl! Let me go!" the blonde glowered. He tried to pry his hand away from the squinty-eyed Uzumaki, but to no avail. His grip was amazingly strong.

"Shut it..." Laharl muttered seriously. "Do you want his sacrifice to be in vain?"

That quieted Naruto. He looked somewhat abashed, realizing what Laharl meant. How stupid was he? The squinty-eyed Uzumaki probably felt as bad as he was right now, leaving Buds behind. After all, they had spent some considerable time together. No matter how Laharl acted with disregard against the other two, deep down...

"You wouldn't catch me dead by some stupid ghost..." Laharl muttered. "Thank Buds' stupidity and his 'noble'-ness to do something stupid like self-sacrifice..."

Naruto looked at the purple-headed Uzumaki with a withered glare.

"You're an asshole," he growled.

* * *

Buds didn't pause as he felt his brothers run, and grabbed his bag, and grabbed out the water canteen. He then made the sign of the cross, and began to mumble a prayer. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the pink teddy bear coming at him. He finished his prayer with a strong grunt, and straightened, and opened the canteen.

"STOP! I HAVE THE ALMIGHTY AND I'M NOT AFRAID TO USE HIM!" he shouted towards the bear, which slowed its pace.

"Hah! Got you there, didn't I? Impure spirit... taste the holy wrath of the gods!" he shouted, throwing the whole content towards the bear.

The water splashed the bear, stopping it on its tracks. For a wild moment, Buds looked in surprise, wondering if he had indeed blessed the water, and purified the ghost, only to stumble back when he heard a rather frightful angry scream emanating from the bear.

"_GYAAH! You meanie! You wet Kuma-chan!" _

Buds found his eyes widening as big as platters as the bear suddenly grew five times bigger its original size, its hands were now sporting some very large and very sharp-looking claws that made the Uzumaki turn tail, and run faster than he ever did.

"WAIT UP!" he shouted, hoping to call on his brothers. That was the last time he'll play hero! Or even try to think he could bless drinking water!

* * *

Far away from Buds was the other two Uzumaki, Naruto and Laharl, who had heard their brother scream.

"What was that?" Naruto asked.

"It's his blood-curling scream... his final moments..." Laharl looked up. "Rest in peace."

"Don't kill him too early!" Naruto screamed exasperatedly.

"Face facts, Naruto... heroes die first!" Laharl declared, and then pointed a finger to himself. "Unlike me, a badass Overlord, you won't see me dying in this stup..."

He didn't get to finish as his left foot landed on... nothing. Laharl's arms flayed as his eyes widened when he realized that they had run into a pitfall and if it wasn't for Naruto's impeccable timing, who grabbed the ex-Overlord by the collar of his dark purple jacket, he'd have fallen into the abyss.

"Yes... badass overlord dying by falling into a pit-fall..." Naruto muttered, his lips forming a wry smile as he dug his legs and bent his knees to drag the squinty-eyed Uzumaki back to solid ground.

"Shut up!" Laharl declared, though the blonde knew that he was embarrassed about the situation. "Pull me over! I'm tipping!"

"Yeah... sure..." Naruto grunted as he struggled pulling his brother back. "You need to lose some weight."

"Idiot! You're just weak!"

"This isn't the time to for your pride, Overlord brat," the blonde threatened. "Its time for you to kiss my ass."

Whether Laharl was about to reply to that was not heard as the shouting of Buds came nearer and nearer. The two looked behind them, wondering what was going on, only to see their brother running blindly at them.

"Whoa... whoa... WHOA!" Naruto shouted the last part as Buds just slammed into him so hard, the three fell off the cliff.

"Buds... you stupid MORON!" Laharl shouted before he joined his other two brothers in the scream-fest.

* * *

Naruto didn't know how long he had been unconscious, but he found himself staring at the slightly lit cavern ceiling as he opened his eyes. Groggily, he wondered what happened to him, only to hear a mumble at his side.

Laharl groaned as he felt his whole body felt like it was on fire, and feeling a heavy Buds on top of him was not making it easier. He growled as he tried to shove the offending body away.

"Geroff me you moron! Idiot!" Laharl continued to berate, still feeling sore that they had to fall into the abyss... they were extremely lucky not to be dead.

"Hmmm... Hinata..." Buds whispered.

A twitch developed in Laharl's head, and with all his power, he slammed his fist to Buds' head, who immediately sat up in grimaced pain.

"Wha… uh… wha?" the brown haired Uzumaki muttered, standing up.

"You landed on me you moron!" Laharl growled as he flipped to a stand, wiping off the dust in his clothes. He looked around for the blonde Uzumaki, who was a few paces beside him, shaking his head.

"Hey… you guys okay?" Naruto asked rather worriedly, still shaking his head, trying to stamp out the cobwebs.

"Yeah… no thanks to this moron…" Laharl muttered before he gave the still dizzy Buds a swift kick on the back. "Where are we?"

Naruto paused, and looked around. The place… was lit by something. Their torches were lost during the fall, and without being fed with chakra, they should have been dead… but the whole place seemed to have an ethereal glow to it.

"Uh… guys… look at this…" Buds called from his downed position, pointing towards a rather large pile of… oddities.

Laharl and Naruto dashed immediately towards the mound, and found themselves looking at rather exotic items. Some, they could recognize, some, looked only somewhat familiar. It wasn't until they dove deeply enough in it to realize what they were.

"It's like some armory," Buds muttered, now joining his two brothers. "Look… handguns? Is that a rocket launcher?"

Laharl nodded, though when he handled them, they were relatively useless. The guns had no bullets, and the rocket launcher seemed used. But there was one thing that caught his attention… a crimson sheathed straight-sword, emanating rather powerful dark energy.

Buds was on another place, his eyes widening at the odd looking rings. He knew what they were, as they were stocked with magical powers. They magical rings that acted like magical wands, something he had been looking for quite some time to stabilize his magics. Having his own spells blow up in his face wasn't something he'd care to repeat… and as a bonus, the ring wouldn't even be in conflict to his fighting styles.

Naruto, on the other hand, drifted more towards the ninja-looking tools. He found a collection of kunai he had never seen before, and even a weapon that looked like a cross of kunai and a throwing star. However… his interest was solely more on a rather interesting scroll that was titled **Dummy's Guide to Blood Seals**.

"Impossible…" Laharl muttered as he took hold of the sword and easily read the demonic runes that were etched on its sheath. "The Shadow Blade…!?"

"What's that?" Buds asked as he took a rather handsome brown with black designed ring, and wore it on his finger, feeling his magics suddenly channeling towards the ring, awaiting to be unleashed.

Naruto joined Naruto, with the scroll now safely tucked in his bag.

"This is a demonic war artifact… Shadow Blade," Laharl muttered. He tried to unsheathe it, only to find it stuck, and growled. "Won't let me use it unless I fulfill its contract…"

"What contract?" Naruto asked.

Laharl didn't answer, and just growled, trying to unsheathe it once more. He didn't get far, as there was suddenly a loud exploding sound that shook the cavern they were in. Alert, the brothers gasped as they felt the chill on their backs again, and in the empty air, that voice came in again…

"_Ahaha… I found youuuu!" _

Something was coming at them. Naruto and Laharl's eyes widened when they saw what it was; a gigantic teddy bear with huge claws on each hand, looking at them with glowing eyes. The two took a step back, wondering what the hell they were going to do.

Buds took a step forward, his eyes closed. He smirked as he finally had a means to fight against ghosts. With the chakra torch armed in one hand, and the ring in the ring finger of his other, he began to chant.

"Omega Del Atla!" he called, speaking his starting incantation, feeling his magics finally roving around his body. He then began to speak in Latin, focusing all those magical energy into his words. "Mother Earth, I call on your rage to throttle my enemies! Stone Punch!"

The cavern wall suddenly seemed to twist as under the large pink bear, a form of a giant fist came forth and hit it with a force it was forced on its back, landing on the floor rather hard, making the whole cavern wall shake.

Buds looked back at his brothers. "Well?" he asked. "Let's go!"

"No need to tell us twice!" Naruto declared as he followed his brother. Laharl followed, grinning as he spotted the fallen teddy bear.

"Hey, stupid," the squinty-eyed Uzumaki called towards the bear. "You aren't even worth as a PC Level One Boss!"

"_MEANIE!" _

The voice shook the cavern walls, making Naruto look back towards Laharl with an ugly frown. "What are you, nuts!?" he demanded.

"Oh come on! The stupid ghost's beaten!" Laharl laughed out rather nastily. "No fear from there!"

The cavern walls shook again, and the bear who had been knocked down now turned on its belly, and glaring at the running figures. It suddenly stood up again, and roared as it suddenly began chasing them again.

Laharl's eyes widened to platters as he saw this, and looked back at front, and received the death glares of both Buds and Naruto.

"Uh… oops?" the squinty-eyed Uzumaki declared.

"IDIOT!" the other two Uzumaki's shouted as they ran faster.

"_You bullies!" _

The bear began to run faster, much to the Uzumakis' chagrin, and ran faster, going left and rights of the tunnels without really much afterthought… the only concern they had was escaping this ghost before she crushes them, or whatever!

"Wait…!" Naruto noticed something as they turned into another path in the cavern. "Isn't… isn't that the glass spheres we were throwing?"

Buds' eyes widened, and relief suddenly overcame him. "COME ON! WE'RE GETTING OUTTA HERE!" he shouted.

In the haze of their exhaustion from their continuous running, the three Uzumaki forced themselves to look far ahead, and the when they saw a small fleeting source of light that wasn't from the chakra torch that was in Buds' hand, they ran even faster.

"WE'RE THERE!" Buds declared, panting. "FASTER! FASTER!"

"WH… F… F… F… FREEDOM!" Naruto declared as the three brothers exited the cave, the rope coming off as the force of the three Uzumakis hit it with a force, and they jumped as they felt a powerful explosion behind them.

Dust was raised, and the explosion made them almost deaf, but otherwise, the three boys were relatively unhurt. The three looked at each other from their position, smiling. Exhausted, the three sat up looking back at the damage that was caused, only to stop cold when in front of them, they saw the pink teddy bear, though now in normal size, being carried by the very same girl they had seen earlier.

Naruto immediately got ready, as well as Buds and Laharl, the second ready to chant if the ghost was about to attack them… but she didn't. Her eyes weren't focused on them, but on her surroundings, and when she did face them, her purple eyes, almost similar, if not darker, color of her hair was moist, as tears seemed to flow from them.

"_I… I am free…" _she stated, though still somewhat eerie, was less scarier sounding than it was on the cave. _"I… I thank you…" _

And her form then turned transparent, her tears still flowing. The three Uzumaki brothers looked at the scene with different emotions: Naruto found himself feeling somewhat sad and melancholic… while Buds looked somewhat relieved, now that probably she wasn't out to get them. Laharl, lastly, felt annoyed that such a simple ghost made him run that much.

Her form finally disappeared from their view, and the teddy bear fell down to the ground. The three Uzumaki looked at the stuffed toy for a moment before Naruto deemed it safe enough to approach, though Buds and Laharl had been somewhat defensive. When the blonde finally picked the bear up, did they all breath easier.

"She attained peace, eh?" Buds guessed.

"Moved on…" Naruto looked up in the sky, with the sun setting towards the horizon. He smiled. "I… I feel happy for her."

"Che…" Laharl muttered in annoyance. He looked towards Naruto, and frowned. "What next?"

Naruto gently hugged the teddy bear, carrying with him as he walked back towards the forest, away from Kyubi's Lair. Sure, he hadn't gotten a clue on how to see his sister, but at least he was able to see where she had lived before he was born, and he was satisfied with that for now.

His hand went over the bag he had been dragging for a while, and felt the scroll he had found in the caverns, and his eyes roamed towards Buds who was now looking at his new ring with satisfaction, while Laharl was still holding the blade he had found, studying it even more closely.

Naruto then spotted the fedora hat that Buds had given him earlier on the ground ahead of him… it must have blown out of his head when he jumped. Grabbing it, he wore it, and turned to smile at his brothers.

"Lets go home!"

"Alright!" Buds stated with relief. He felt well enough to continue, his fatigue from constant running disappeared on him. Judging by the way the other two were acting they seemed ready for the trip home as well.

"Yeah, yeah…" Laharl muttered.

The three Uzumaki boys, now armed with tools to help them on their lives, jumped towards the trees, and dashed back home, one branch at a time.

* * *

"Uh… Naruto…" Buds called as the three boys entered through the East Gate, greeted by a large group of angry looking jounins, and a rather pissed off looking Hokage, staring at them with a small concentration of killing intent. "They looked pissed…"

"U-zu-makis…" the Hokage had muttered, his voice shaking.

Naruto and Laharl looked at each other with worried eyes and frowns, and were about to turn to run when more jounins appeared behind them.

It seems they were in deep trouble.

Very deep trouble.

**To Be Continued…**

* * *

_**Additional Notes:**_

_**(1) - **__Read Uzumaki Naruto Ninja Chronicles, Chapter 1: Sacrifice! Naruto's New Powers!_

* * *

**Next: **

Its Orientation Day… and finally the day Buds will finally receive his long awaited answer from one Hyuga Hinata. Plus, assigned to teams, who will the three Uzumaki's be teamed up with!?

* * *

(This chapter has been rewritten)

_Author's Notes: _

_Longest chapter I have ever written… always wondered whether to cut the clone war battle… but I liked it too much to do so. Enjoy guys! _


	4. Chapter 4

**Buds: Love Comedy, Part 1**

* * *

"That is the last time I'm gonna piss old man Hokage off…" Naruto declared as he rubbed his back. Laharl had been rubbing his own sore legs, while the relaxed Buds looked at them with a small grin.

"You guys deserved it," he muttered.

The Hokage had made those two pay for that absolutely ridiculous clone war two days earlier, which had most of the active jounins and chunins fight some thousand plus Naruto clones into one useless waste of energy of a battle. That night, when the three brothers arrived at from their trip to Kyubi's lair, they were surrounding by a whole lot of jounins with the old man on front.

Buds may have been called the Tag-Along, but this was one punishment he would not join in the two brothers. The Hokage had spared no mercy in planning the punishment for them, and he did in all his power to convince the old man that he had no part of it… even going as far as to place himself into Ibiki's interrogation to prove that.

Thankfully, the Hokage knew he was telling the truth, and spared him from any penalty… but when asked what were they doing out, the brothers lied. Kyubi's Lair, their adventures, and artifacts they had come to posses, and even the ghost that chased them… even before the brothers set foot on Konoha, they agreed talking about it would raise too many questions.

The pink teddy bear that Naruto had brought back was kept in one of the shelves in the apartment, along with the scroll that he found. Laharl's sword, which the squinty-eyed Uzumaki kept studying with his limited free time, was hanging on the wall. No matter what he tried, the sword would never leave its sheath.

Not that it mattered. The two Uzumakis were given probably one of the most tiring jobs, and the most disgusting, in fact. The Nara's deer feeding grounds and cages have never been cleaner, nor have the Inuzuka's kennels more pleasant to stay in… but probably the worst the Aburame's Kikai bug hives. Cleaning up the hollow pockets of where the young pupae evolved to adults… was absolutely ghastly.

Laharl and Naruto swore to themselves to never woo an Aburame girl and have advised Buds to do the same thing. After all, how do you cope with cleaning gigantic hives while those bugs were crawling all over you?

The answer never really came even until now, where presently, the three brothers were in Ichiraku for lunch, cleaning house. Naruto was already taking in his sixth bowl, while Laharl, who was too tired and exhausted to do his usual demand for steak, was on his fourth. Buds, modestly, was on his second.

"Orientation Day tomorrow…" Buds declared, earning him the sound of relief from his brothers.

"Heh… yeah… finally… going to a team!" Naruto declared happily. "Wonder who I will land with this time…"

"Probably Team 7 again…" Laharl muttered.

"Wha? Why?" the blonde demanded.

"Face it, Naruto, between the three of us… you rarely go to class, barely pass your exams… you're the class' number one 'Dead Last'," Buds declared.

"Ugh! Only Sasuke-teme gets to call me that!" Naruto muttered, looking hurt. "Besides… Laharl barely gets to classes as he usually goofs out with me!"

"Yeah, but I passed the exams… dead last…" Laharl countered.

"I'm gonna make shish kebab out of you, Ovvie Brat…" Naruto declared with a narrowed death-glare towards his brother.

"Heh, now, now you two," Buds stated, trying to calm things down.

"I wish we could form our own team," the blonde affirmed with a frown. "Would be so cool if the three Uzumaki Brothers were grouped together, eh? We can call ourselves the Trinity Team."

"I can't deny that it'll be one heck of a way to spend the whole time in this world… but…" Buds looked at his brother. "Don't you want to spend time with Sakura again?"

"Uh… well… yeah, sure," Naruto scratched his head. "But… she's nothing compared to…"

The blonde boy turned silent, and began slurping his noodles, leaving the two brothers looking between themselves knowingly.

"Sister-complex," Laharl muttered, dead-panned.

"Oh shut up!" Naruto muttered. "It's not like she's my real sist… er… I'll shut up now."

"Yes, please do," Buds laughed.

"Well… what about you!?" the blonde demanded towards his brown haired brother suddenly. "I thought you said you were going to admit your love for Hinata-chan at graduation day. Until now, you haven't even said a word about it!"

Buds looked at Naruto, and to Laharl, who now looked interested. He scratched his head.

"Well?" the squinty-eyed Uzumaki asked. "How'd it go? Rejected?"

"Uh… well… truthfully…" Buds swallowed. "I… I kinda chickened out."

There was a slight moment when Naruto and Laharl looked at their brother incredulously, before proceeding in falling off their chairs.

"WHAT!?" Naruto shouted, as he flipped back to his seat. "You were dropping hints for years! And you chickened out!?"

"Heh… he's the Luckless Wonder…" Laharl chuckled, and finished his last bowl. "It may actually be better for him…"

"Yeah… if I remember correctly, he was the one who would always get caught by the mob of girls when we were developing the Sexy no Jutsu," Naruto considered their excursions in the bathe houses, and many females chasing them out for peeping at them. Buds was the only one who got caught.

"He also was the one who strolled in the female locker rooms the first day in the academy… pretty much branded him as the pervert for the first year," Laharl smirked.

"How about the time he crashed into Kurenai's apartment back when she was still a chunin, hands on her breasts, head on her crotch?" the blonde asked, chuckling. "Hokage had to stop her before she was about to stab him to death!"

"Yeah… Buds… take it from us…" Laharl nodded, "its better not to engage a relationship. Knowing your luck… you're gonna get rejected."

"Big time," Naruto finished.

Open palms slammed the counter-table of Ichiraku, and Buds stood up, a brownish aura flaring up around him. His mouth formed a rather cruel smile, his eyes covered by his hair.

"Ku ku ku…" he chuckled. "You're both gonna eat those words."

Swiftly, the usually calm brother walked away from the other two, leaving Naruto to look at Laharl confused. The squinty eyed Uzumaki could only just look back, and then both shrugged.

"One more bowl! Beef!" the blonde had ordered.

* * *

Back at the Uzumaki's apartment, Buds wondered how he was going to get to it. His mind raced as he thought of many ways to finally woo his long time crush, but with the implications brought out by his two brothers made him wonder if they were right all along… was this worth it?

_No! Don't listen to those idiots! _Buds thought rather deliberately. _If there is a will… there is a way! _

"Eh… even if I think that… I got nil," Buds whispered to himself. "How am I supposed to confess?"

The brown haired Uzumaki found himself in the middle of the clutter of their apartment, and had a great idea.

_Let me clean up to calm down…_

Then past that, it was almost supper.

_Let me think about it after doing dinner…_

Then following supper...

_And after I do the dishes…_

Until it was finally at dead of night, Buds sitting up in his futon, biting the blanket.

_Muuu… I haven't thought of anything at all! _

Buds sighed as he slid down from his position; beside him were the peaceful sleeping forms of his brothers. He covered his head with a blanket. It didn't really matter now, did it? Perhaps his brothers were right… who was he kidding?

The image of Hinata's fleeting smile appeared on his head… and he sat up again.

Was he really okay with this? They were about to get their teams… unless if by some stroke of luck… no, miracle! would the gods suddenly plan to bring him and the Hyuga girl together in one team, he would not be seeing her again in a while.

_Rather regret doing nothing at all… its better to regret after doing it. _

He knew what he should do.

_I should confess my feelings! _

Out of the futon, Buds left his sleeping brothers to their dreams, and went immediately towards the desk, and switched on the lampshade. He grabbed a piece of paper, and stared at the white emptiness for minutes.

_Any great writer had only started with a blank piece of paper and a piece of pen… Hinata-dono… watch as I write my feelings in a chain of melody, unwrapped in the ethereal bonds of love! _

_But… what do I write? Hmmm…_

Buds began spinning the pen around his thumb.

_Well… I suppose I could start with 'suki'… love. Yes… All I have to do… is write __**suki**__._

* * *

Dear Hinata…

I su… su… love to see you ski…

* * *

Buds slammed his head on the paper, before ripping it to shreds. He grabbed another piece of paper, and forced himself to make it right.

* * *

Dear Hinata…

I su… su… skip…

* * *

Buds dropped his pen down in shock, and ripped out the paper again.

_Calm down! Calm down! _

* * *

Dear Hinata…

I su… su… sukiyaki –

* * *

_NO! _

* * *

Dear Hinata…

I… su… suki ga nai kamae…

* * *

_I asked her to show me the stance without weakness…!? I'm… I'm pathetic!! _

* * *

Dear Hinata…

I su… su… skill-up…

* * *

_AUGH! _

* * *

The next morning, Naruto woke up from his restful sleep, finding it odd that he wasn't smelling any garlic aroma in the air. Standing up, he noticed the lampshade open, and Buds sitting there, stiff as a board.

"Hey… Buds…" Naruto muttered, yawning. He approached his brother from his back, and there, he could see a blank piece of paper, and a pen… on his shaking right hand. "Uh… you okay?"

"WHAT AM I GONNA DO!?" Buds suddenly shouted, grabbing the shocked blonde at the collar of his shirt, tears pouring like waterfalls out of his eyes. His voice was so loud that even Laharl had awoken from his slumber.

"What the hell!?" Laharl declared, sitting up from the futon.

"I didn't write anything at all!! I can't write anything at all!!" Buds continued to moan.

"C… calm down!" Naruto stated, trying to take out Buds' hands off his shirt before he ripped them apart. "Look… uh… I'll prepare breakfast… you just write… whatever… okay?"

"Wh… whatever?" Buds asked, calming down. He then nodded, and went back to the desk.

_That's right! _he thought. _I'll just tell her how I feel… and then just tell her to meet me somewhere so I can explain myself better! _

Seeing his brother cool down and going back to the desk and paper, Naruto wandered around the kitchen, wondering what the heck that was about. Write what? Sheesh… his brother could be so desperate and weird at times.

Knowing his cooking skills were not up to par, the only thing he put on the stove was a kettle with water, grabbed a few instant ramen cups from the cupboards, and then grabbed three cartons of milk from the fridge. He knew he would hear Laharl's complaints later, but didn't care. Buds needed a break it seems, and after he had been kind enough to usually cook food for them each and every morning, it was Naruto's turn to give him the rest he needed.

Waiting to boil, then the cooking of the instant ramen itself took about six minutes, and by that time, it seems Buds had calmed down, though obviously lacking in sleep; his eyes had bags under them. He stalked towards his place in the table and without complaint, slurped on his noodles and drank his milk without much emotion.

"Ugh… what is it with this instant shit?" Laharl demanded as he came towards the kitchen.

Naruto sighed… it was going to be a long morning.

* * *

The Uzumaki brothers strolled on to school quite earlier than usual, very much oblivious to all the stares given to them. Naruto, for one, because he had gotten used to it by now; Laharl, because he would stare back at them, and they'd flinch away; Buds, finally, because he was more worried of what's to come.

When they finally arrived at the academy, the brown haired Uzumaki suddenly looked towards his brother, and announced something.

"Um… guys…" he scratched his head. "I… I gotta go somewhere for now. I'll meet you back at the classroom later… alright?"

Naruto and Laharl looked at him with a slight surprise, and then just nodded. They were somewhat curious as to what spawned the behavior of their usually calm brother… he was the one that asked the two brothers to leave for the academy earlier than usual, and he was, just this morning, in a state of nervous wreck.

As the two left Buds on his own, he immediately went for the lockers. Studying Hinata a lot of times during their tenure as academy students, he always knew what time she came to school, usually, and what she does when she arrives. Therefore, armed with that knowledge, Buds immediately went towards the lockers, and his hand gently went towards his left inner jacket pocket, and extracted a crisp white envelope with Hinata's name written in front.

He looked around for a moment and made sure no one was around.

_Hinata-dono, be prepared to receive the greatest love letter I have ever written, _Buds thought with a rather confident smile, and inserted the envelope through the slit of the locker door, and immediately left the vicinity, running up towards his classroom.

* * *

"Beginning today… you are all real ninjas," Iruka stated with a proud smile as he addressed all of his students. "But remember… you all are just rookie genin. The hard part just started. I want you all to remember that."

Buds looked at his side, and checked over at Hinata's, trying to see if she had received his letter… and from her somewhat embarrassed and surprised look, it seems she did.

_Of course, she could just have stomach cramps…_ Buds chuckled jokingly.

"Now… we are going to divide you up into three-man teams, and assign you a jounin sensei to complete missions with…" Iruka smirked as some of the students looked surprised. "We… tried to balance each team's strength, so we have decided on these. Team 1…"

As Iruka continued down on his list, Buds wondered for a moment what he was going to tell her when they meet later on.

_How do I start? _he thought. _Do I open with something sweet? _

"_**You have beautiful eyes… makes me want to kiss it." **_

_Ugh… that's something Naruto would say… _Buds hit his forehead with an open palm. _"How about something… cool? _

"_**Yo…" **_

_Reminds me too much of Kakashi… how about something… normal? _

"_**Hey, Hinata-san… fancy seeing you here…" **_

_Of course, I can just act like a total imbecile…_

"_**Hinata-chan, my darling!" **_

Buds laughed aloud as that thought entered his head, earning him a look from everyone around the class.

"Buds, do you have something to add?" Iruka asked, looking curious.

"Maybe he thinks you suck at making teams, sensei," Laharl interjected. The class laughed.

"Of course not, idiot!" Buds declared back, earning another laugh from the class.

"Now, now, quiet down," Iruka said. "Team 7… Haruno Sakura, Uzumaki Naruto…"

"Wha…!?" Sakura stood up, about to protest.

"… and Uchiha Sasuke."

"YAY!" the pink haired declared, raising her arms as her protest was now drowning in her celebration of just snagging the hottest (in her mind) boy of her year.

"Meh…" Naruto muttered, looking at Buds and Laharl, who both shrugged their shoulders. Looks like they were right.

"Team 8," Iruka continued. "Hyuga Hinata, Inuzuka Kiba, and Aburame Shino.

"Team 9, Uzumaki Laharl, Uzumaki Ten… uh, Buds, and…" Iruka smirked slightly, knowing full well the last person in the team. "Morino Ami."

Buds and Laharl looked at each other, confused. Who the hell was Morino Ami? She wasn't part of the class, that was obvious.

"Team 10," Iruka continued, "Yamanaka Ino, Nara Shikamaru, and Akimichi Chouji…"

"Time out! Time out!" Naruto declared, looking somewhat annoyed. "Why am I in a team with this bum!?" he pointed towards Sasuke. "Why not with my brothers!?"

"Naruto…" Iruka sighed. "You and Laharl are among the bottom list… you were dead last. And Buds was just average, really. There is no way you three would have balanced each other."

"Eh… come on! Damn it…" the blonde Uzumaki muttered, before sitting down.

"Hn… don't get in the way, dead last," Sasuke muttered with an arrogant smirk.

"Don't worry, chicken butt," Naruto muttered with a growl, earning ire from almost all the females in the room, but the Uzumaki didn't care, a bit teed off that he wasn't with his brothers.

"Now, now…" Iruka called, distracting the class. "This afternoon, we'll introduce the jounin senseis. Until then… take your lunch break."

* * *

Lunch break… outside the Academy, at the back. Buds had immediately left the classroom when Iruka called the break, and hid among the numerous trees present. This was the area where he asked Hinata to meet him and until now, he had no idea what to tell to her. Then, a sober thought hit him… what if she didn't show up?

_That will definitely suck… _

He then remembered then what he wrote, his panic now increasing at a rather alarming rate.

_Maybe… maybe the letter wasn't good? What would I do then? Or… or… or maybe she won't come because it's not from… Naruto…_

Above his head, thunder and rain clouds were forming, pouring down on his fallen head.

_Oh… what the hell… who am I kidding? _Buds thought darkly. _It's hopeless. I'm hopeless. Maybe those were really right… maybe it's not meant to- _

"Oh… Hinata-san…" Sakura's voice was heard.

_Its fate! Its destiny! The gods have spoken! _Buds cheered up suddenly, the rain clouds gone replaced by the sun and chirping birds. Looking from his hiding place, Buds could easily see Hyuga Hinata and Haruno Sakura, talking together.

In the shy Hyuga's hands… was the letter Buds had written.

_YES! YES! YES! _Buds thought happily, pumping his hand up and down with ever 'yes' coming through his head.

"What brings you here?" Sakura asked.

"Uh… ano…" Hinata blushed. "I'm… I'm waiting for someone…"

"For who…?" Sakura paused as she noticed the letter Hinata had been holding. "Oooh… is… is that a love letter?"

"Uh… h… hai…"

"Let me see!" Sakura exclaimed, immediately grabbing the letter from the shy Hyuga.

"Ano… wait!" Hinata protested, but that was ignored as Sakura opened the letter, and looked at who it was first.

"Wha… it's anonymous?"

_WHA-!? _Buds' eyes widened. _I didn't sign with my name!?_

The brown haired Uzumaki then began slamming his head towards the tree.

_IDIOT! _

**SLAM! **

_MORON!_

**SLAM!**

"Well… no wonder!" Sakura muttered, reading the contents. "If I wrote a poem as stupid as this… I wouldn't sign my name!"

Buds' eyes narrowed as she said that. She just didn't diss his poem now did she? He looked at them again, and to his shock, he saw Sakura preparing herself to read the contents aloud.

_Wha… NO! WAIT! _

And his protests died when Sakura opened her mouth… and read his poem out loud.

"Thank you!" is what I want to say…

First of all, for raising you to be such a cute girl

I want to say "Thank you!" 

To the gods and your mother…

Sakura couldn't help herself, and snorted and laughed herself silly, holding her stomach in pain caused by the induced laughter.

"Hahahaha! Who wrote this!? What was the point of writing a serious love letter that's so hilarious!?" she asked.

Behind the trees, the killing intent sent out by Buds was scaring the birds as he heard the pink haired shinobi laugh even louder.

_I'm going to kill you, Haruno Sakura… I will beat you to bloody pulp, break your bones, cut you to little pieces, and feed you to the SHARKS! Oh yes… your screams will induce euphoria as pull out your limbs one by one… YOU JUST WAIT! _

"Uh… really?" Hinata suddenly interjected, making Buds pause on his murderous thoughts. He looked back at the Hyuga who was now looking at the letter.

"I… I can understand the feelings from this letter…" the shy Hyuga said with a bit of longing. "And… and I'm inspired by it…"

She closed her eyes, folding the note.

"This warm and heartfelt letter…" she whispered. "I wish I had the… the courage… to do this."

_Hinata-dono… _Buds felt his tears falling. _You're… an angel. And… I'm a damn idiot. Why the hell am I hiding here? _

The brown-haired Uzumaki gathered his courage, inspired by the girl of his heart, and slid from his hiding place, and approached the two girls, his head held up high. Win or lose… it doesn't matter. What is important is how someone plays the game. The real loser… is the one who never even tries.

A coward.

He took a step, and another. Each felt easier as he continued, so he continued on… step by step… until he gained speed. This was it. He was finally going to tell her… he was going to tell Hyuga Hinata his heartfelt…

**Krrrrrr...**

"Ugh!" Buds clutched his stomach suddenly as it felt like it was spinning around on its own, his legs twisting across each other like snakes. "Wha… what the hell…!?"

_Bathroom… NOW! _

Sakura was the first to realize his presence, followed by Hinata. The sight of Buds speeding at towards them took them by surprise.

"Wha… Tenshin-san was the one that wrote that-"

Sakura never finished her sentence as the speeding boy shoved her away.

"OUT OF THE WAY!"

Buds raced away from the two, leaving a spectacular cloud of dust in his wake. The two kunoichis looked more confused when he disappeared from their view.

"Oh… I guess not…" Sakura sighed, rather disappointed. "Still… why was he in a hurry?"

Hinata had no reply. She was more confused than the other kunoichi was.

* * *

In the Uzumaki apartments, the Hokage, Kakashi, and another male jounin looked around the kitchen.

"Well… this is where they lived…" the Hokage stated.

"Hmmm…" Kakashi looked towards table, one of the milk cartons there opened. He grabbed it, and sniffed it.

"What is it, Kakashi-sempai?" the male jounin asked.

"This milk has gone bad recently…" Kakashi replied.

* * *

Slamming the bathroom door, the brown-haired Uzumaki rushed towards the stall without a moment lost, took down his pants, and sat down the throne. Instantly, he felt relief.

"Damn it… I was so close!" Buds muttered. "What the hell set that off?"

"I'm also curious," replied a voice from the next stall.

"Laharl!?" the brown haired Uzumaki asked, surprised.

"Ehehehe… you two as well?" another voice came from another stall.

"Naruto!?" Buds demanded.

"Yeah… I think we all ate something bad…" the blonde's voice stated.

"You think!?" Laharl muttered with disgust. "Ugh… something's coming out again…"

Buds groaned. He was just about to tell Hinata his feelings… and thanks to his luck…

"This stinks…" the brown haired Uzumaki muttered.

"Like yours don't!" the squinty-eyed Uzumaki declared.

"Ugh…" Buds just groaned as a comedic coda played.

**To Be Continued…**

* * *

**Next: **

_While Team 7 wait for the ever late Kakashi, Team 9 is now meeting their third member, and their jounin sensei… but… she's… kinda weird. Very weird. _

* * *

_Author's Note:_

_What can I say? Luckless. XD Ja ne! _


	5. Chapter 5

**Team 9: The Introduction of Morino Ami**

* * *

Naruto, Laharl, and Buds had come back to the classroom, looking worse for wear. They had spent almost the whole break in that stuffy bathroom expelling whatever they have ingested in the past few hours... and they were now hungry and weak for it. After much deliberation, the two brothers agreed that the blonde one was the cause of all their suffering, even though they had no real idea what he did.

"Last time I'm leaving Naruto in charge of the kitchen..." Buds muttered.

"I second that fact," Laharl declared.

"Eh... come on," Naruto grinned, scratching the back of his head. "Its not like we died or something..."

The two brothers glared at him.

"I'll... shut up."

"Yeah..." Buds muttered, feeling rather let down at the fact that he just probably blew the only chance he had of telling the Hyuga girl of the class his feelings.

Laharl wasn't really much annoyed, more like angry at the fact that an Overlord (conveniently forgetting the fact that he wasn't one anymore) like him had been forced to hiding in a bathroom, and doing rather unmentionable things. He hadn't been so humiliated in his life... well, there was a time that his photos spread out in his netherworld. He could never forget Etna and Flonne looking at the pictures, giggling like a bunch of morons.

Naruto, though... kept mostly to himself. He had avoided a kiss from Sasuke-teme, which was already a mark on how good his day has been. Other than the fact that he was still stuck with the bum and his former crush rather than his brothers... or the fact that he had to take the same trip towards the bathroom... it was still a nice day.

"Team 9," Buds stated with a rather curious look. "Morino Ami... if we take what Iruka-sensei said to account, with Laharl being on the bottom..."

The squinty-eyed Uzumaki jumped, and spun around, his extended leg almost hitting the brown-haired Uzumaki, who nimbly dodged his attack with ease.

"Stop it," Buds growled. "I wasn't insulting you."

"Che..." Laharl muttered distastefully, but stopped his attacks.

"If Laharl is one of the bottom... and I'm just average... then to balance that out, this Morino Ami should be... the higher up of the class, maybe even best," the brown haired Uzumaki reasoned.

"The best of the class is Sasuke..." the squinty-eyed Uzumaki declared.

"And add to the fact that there is no such person in our class," Naruto wondered. "Meh... you guys landed in a very interesting team... so interesting that you guys have no idea who you are teamed up with."

"I'd rather have landed on Team 8..." Buds moaned.

"And replace Kiba with someone who slobbers worse than him?" Laharl asked.

"I do not slobber!"

"Oh, fine... drool!" the squinty-eyed Uzumaki declared.

"Oi! I do not drool!" the brown-haired Uzumaki retorted. "My saliva glands are just... uh... somewhat overloaded with chakra when it sees beautiful women."

"You did not just say that with a straight face," Naruto raised his eyebrow, knowing full well that Buds was just poking fun at Laharl with his odd sense of self-depreciating humor.

"Well... it's better than my 'kunai' joke..." Buds declared with a wide smile.

A normal reaction would be Naruto laughing aloud, catching the drift of his joke, while Laharl looked annoyed, but before they could even start with the routine, someone seemed to have beaten them to it.

"Heh..."

The Uzumaki brothers blinked, surprised to find someone listening in their conversation. Alert, and ready, they spotted a rather graceful looking kunoichi leaning on a wall. She was older than they were and wore a rather odd set of clothes...

She was dressed in a body-tight black suit, much obliged to Buds' eyes (and a thorn to Laharl's). It extended from her chest to her thighs... it would probably not have left much to the imagination but most of her 'womanly' features were hidden ibehind a dark blue jacket, zipped up until the collarbone, and on her waist was a miniskirt, same color as her jacket, accented by two belts crossing each other.

The belts themselves were no mere accessories. They held a whole bunch of rather interesting looking weapons... from normal kunais, to odd-looking shurikens, and something that got the three Uzumaki's attention.

Her holsters were holding scalpels... the weapons that the Trinity Master used. However, unlike the straight edged ones, they have been curved somewhat, like hooks. To make things even more interesting, the gloves she wore looked rather unique. It looked plain at first, but the way they felt small sparks of chakra run across them made the brothers realize there was more than meets the eye with those gloves.

Her brown hair was cut rather short, and her face was shaped somewhat like a heart, but chiseled, and rather harsh. Her lips were full, accented by a beautiful red color, and her brown eyes narrowed as she looked at them, studying, sizing them up.

She was a very beautiful kunoichi, but came off as cruel, unsympathetic... and rather dangerous.

"So... you two are the ones on my team... pathetic," she stated harshly.

Laharl glowered, feeling somewhat pissed while Buds looked rather curious.

"Uh... are you... Morino Ami?" the brown-haired Uzumaki asked.

She nodded, looked at Buds, and declared, "Uzumaki Tenshin. Likes to call himself Buds..." she smirked. "Is it because you dislike the name... or because you dislike yourself?"

It was the brown-haired Uzumaki's turn to feel somewhat ticked off as her words hit him like an arrow towards the bulls-eye. He couldn't even get a protest off when she turned, looked at the squinty-eyed purple haired Uzumaki, her lips curving up a few more notches.

"Uzumaki Laharl... odd name, even odder attitude," she declared. "Judging from your disgusted eyes as you look at me, you detest the female form in its glory. Are you a homosexual... or just really immature?"

Laharl's grin came, though with it was the evil backing of his killing intent.

"And I'm teamed up with you two...?" Ami shook her head. "I'll give you two a warning: go home."

The Uzumaki brothers looked at each other, and towards the girl. Did she just tell them to go home?

"Before the jounin sensei comes to pick you both up... disappear," and her hands went towards her inner jacket pocket, which made the three brothers get into their fighting stances. They wondered what kind of weapon she was about to pull out, only to reveal a black book.

"Disappear... and I won't need to use this on you," she stated, showing them the book's title in front.

**Exhilaration of Pain**

"The bible for all interrogators... in it are the details of the most painful, brutal, and bloody tortures, one chapter at a time," she smiled. She flipped it open, and then walked away, reading the book. "I'll be waiting eagerly for your decision. Uzumakis."

Buds swallowed, looking somewhat afraid. Morino... Morino... was that girl related to Ibiki!? She never sent a killing intent, but her words were serious and truthful. She didn't want them in her team... and she had promised pain if they ever dared to cross her wishes.

Laharl looked pissed. He was not to cower under threats, but he knew what he had just seen was a very powerful adversary. Her intents were real... very real. Yet, knowing that full well didn't stop him from feeling excited. He wanted to see her, challenge her... and beat her to the ground.

Naruto looked somewhat jealous towards their brothers. Why couldn't he land with someone as interesting as that!?

* * *

At the classroom, everyone gathered, waiting patiently for their jounin senseis to come and pick them up. While most of them grouped together, talking about how excited they were about the teams, the Uzumaki brothers sat together, wondering how life would serve them now that they where to be, forcefully, separated from each other.

Naruto couldn't really complain... having Team 7 back may not have been his first choice, but it would be like back in the old days.

Well... maybe not exactly in the old days.

While he still feels that he shouldn't use all his ninjutsu skills in his repertoire, unlike before, he now has above than average skills in taijutsu thanks to his morning practices with his brothers. The experience of living more than a hundred years helped him with his battle tactics, and the fact that the chicken butt had no Sharingan yet was making him feel really good at the moment.

Laharl, while he loathed being in a rather weakened body, it was dampened by the fact that he had somewhat full control over the three-tails that was given to him. It was a fact ever so present during the Uzumaki Morning Spars, that even Buds and Naruto's higher fighting skills could never match Laharl's raw power and endurance.

In addition, even now, he felt himself challenged by one young woman. Laharl loved the fleeting feeling; the anticipation of the challenge... the stomach churning awaiting a fight... and the utter joy he'd feel when he beats her.

Buds, on the other hand, was getting scared shitless every moment passed, jumping up out of his seat every time a jounin suddenly came to the room, and called a team.

"Settle down, would you, moron," Laharl growled, feeling tired of the jumpy Uzumaki. He swore if another sensei came in, all left of Buds would be a pile of skin, his skeleton running away.

"Why the hell are we still here!?" Buds demanded softly. "We can still make a run for it you know..."

"The sparky kunoichi wants a challenge... she's going to get one," the squinty-eyed Uzumaki declared, smirking. He looked at his brother. "Besides, what's got you shaking like a leaf? You're the one who usually keeps a calm head around these things..."

"Death, I can face squarely," the brother replied. "But she didn't threaten to kill us. She just threatened to hurt us... badly. That, I don't want."

Laharl just scoffed.

"Ne, Buds... just calm down," Naruto declared, slapping the brown-haired Uzumaki on his back gently. "We three faced together the worst things that the Universes have ever thrown at us... I'm sure you can get this Morino Ami on your side or something."

"Che... Luckless Wonder?" the purple haired Uzumaki laughed. "He'll be first on her death list."

"I'm not the Luckless Wonder... Overlord Brat," Buds growled, some color and mirth coming back to his face.

"Yeah, right," Laharl grinned. "You're the one that chickened out in telling-"

"SHHHH!!" Buds shouted, covering his brother's mouth. "Shut it! Stupid!"

The brown haired Uzumaki found his center again, and he realized it, much to his chagrined. Laharl may or may not have intentionally helped him out of his little rut, and he gave him silent thanks. Overbearing Laharl may be, but was not a total bastard, unlike some people (to which point, Buds stole a look towards Sasuke, who was being annoyed by Sakura).

He was being silly... he knew that. Maybe it was Ibiki's reputation that frightened him more, or the fact that angry women are really much to fear, but Naruto was right. The three survived worse.

"I'm here for Team 8..." a rather calm and collected voice called from the entrance of the classroom. Yuhi Kurenai appeared from everyone's view, and looked around. Spotting her hopeful students, Hinata, Kiba and Shino raising their hands, she was about to call them down when her eyes found themselves staring towards the Uzumakis.

"Oh crap..." Buds muttered, finding himself staring at the rather beautiful crimson eyes of the genjutsu specialist, and hid behind Laharl and Naruto.

Naruto chuckled as he found himself looking at the beautiful jounin's face, transforming... from calm, to anger, to faux tranquility. It seems she still hasn't forgotten what the great Luckless Wonder did to her a year ago. **(1)**

Professional, she was though. Despite the fact that she was somewhat ticked of seeing Buds again, Yuhi Kurenai called her team down, and led them out without another word.

"You're lucky you're not on her team..." Naruto declared.

"He's a masochist," Laharl chuckled. "He'd start to enjoy it after a week of her private tutoring."

"You disturb me sometimes," Buds declared, sighing. "I'm... I'm kinda glad she doesn't really actively hunt me, but..."

He trailed off.

"She's gonna give you a harder time in getting Hinata, right?" the two brothers asked, forming the same conclusion.

"Yup..." the brown haired Uzumaki confirmed. "Pretty much."

"Hell, maybe she'll just sabotage you outright, and tell Hinata that you are one sick perverted bastard," Laharl laughed loud at the idea.

Before Buds could even reply to that, the classroom door slid open, revealing another jounin… while that itself wasn't odd as some have been coming and going, gathering teams, this one was someone even Naruto didn't recognize.

He wore a standard jounin vest, over his full uniform, which consisted of basic black jacket and black pants. His hair was dark colored, cut rather short and spiked up uncontrollably while his rather small dark eyes looked lazy yet alert. At the bottom of his left eye, though, a small scar running from it to the cheek. Like Kakashi, a black cloth covered his mouth and nose, but unlike Kakashi, his forehead protector was on his left arm, kind of like Shikamaru.

"Team 9…?" the jounin called.

Laharl's face shone rather eagerly, and looked at Buds, who took a deep breath. They raised their hands, indicating they were present. The jounin nodded, and called them down.

"I am Asuka Goh," he stated rather quietly. "You are Uzumaki Laharl, and Uzumaki Tenshin, am I right?"

"Yeah, he is Laharl," Buds stated, pointing towards the eager Uzumaki. "And please call me Buds."

Goh didn't answer to that, just motioned them to follow him. Taking one last look towards Naruto, the Uzumaki brothers bade each other farewell, and the two followed their jounin sensei outside the classroom, to whatever destination he had planned... and apparently, that destination was nowhere near the academy. Jumping off a few rooftops, the jounin, Goh, was staying silent as Laharl seemed to have lost his patience, and began asking where they were going.

"Well?" Laharl asked for the fourth time. "Are we going somewhere far? Where's that Ami bitch, anyway? Why are you so quiet? That scar... is that from battle, or did you shave your eyelashes, and missed?"

"As a ninja... I find your mouth spouting off towards your potential enemies disturbing," the jounin muttered rather quietly.

"Say what?" the squinty-eyed Uzumaki.

Buds coughed. "He means you're loud."

"I don't care!" Laharl growled. "We have the right to know where we are..."

"We have arrived."

Landing on the clearing, Laharl and Buds found themselves on a training ground. Bordered by green grass, rocks, and even a small stream of flowing water, the whole place looked so comfortable that Buds visibly relaxed. The brown-haired Uzumaki, whose own affinity to Earth made him forget his worries about Morino Ami and made him lose himself in the beauty of nature of their surroundings.

The purple haired Uzumaki, though, was just looking around on high alert.

"I think I found a haven..." Buds whispered. "This... this is beautiful."

"Eyes on the prize," Laharl growled, staring at a certain area.

A spark of chakra garnered the attention of the distracted Uzumaki, and his eyes darted towards the same place where the ex-Overlord had been staring at for the past few moments, and spotted a figure walking towards them with deliberation. Buds swallowed, but stood his ground as he took deep and relaxing breathes, while Laharl was psyching himself out, his fists ready to explode.

"Is it bravery that makes you two stand against me, Uzumakis, or just stupidity?" Morino Ami asked as she finally came close to the two.

"I assume you three have met," Goh stated quietly.

"Not quite, Goh-sensei..." Ami declared, looking towards the jounin with a smile. "Can you leave us, please? We three have to... introduce ourselves properly."

Goh looked between Ami and towards the Uzumaki brothers, and nodded silently.

"Try not to cause too much damage," he muttered, before he jumped away, disappearing from view, leaving the two brothers and the kunoichi alone in the training grounds.

Ami smiled somewhat, her energy levels spiking again. Laharl looked at her with his own smirk, going immediately to his own fighting style, while Buds panicked as he felt the air around them turn heavy and volatile.

"Hey... guys..." he called desperately.

"I warned you both," the kunoichi declared, her gloves were now littered with electrical energies, roving from one finger to another. "I do not want you guys in my team. You two are not worthy."

"I'm sorry little princess," Laharl snarled, his killing intent spiking. "I do not want to be in this team either. I just want to beat you down."

Buds chuckled nervously as the two looked at each other, one intending to kill, the other looking to dish out pain, and before the brown haired Uzumaki could try to stop them, Laharl came flying towards the kunoichi fast. His fist exploded forward, which Ami nimbly dodged, and with grace, spun around, and hit Laharl at the back of his head with her heel, coming from a spinning turn kick driving him down on the ground with a painful impact so powerful that it left a small crater.

"Heh... one down," Ami declared. There was no way that he'd wake up from that, so her eyes moved towards Buds, who still stood there, in a neutral stance. "You better get ready, Uzumaki number two."

"Uh... Ami-san... Laharl's not..." Buds didn't finish as the kunoichi suddenly felt a powerful hand grabbing her heel, and threw her towards one of the trees.

Ami spun twice around the air before she felt the hard impact on her back. She grunted, and she felt like her insides had rearranged themselves at the crash. Coughing, she was surprised to see Laharl standing, smiling at her.

She growled, very much surprised. It seemed the Uzumaki boy was harder than he looked... and strong too! He threw her with one hand a few meters away! Such a puny body producing such strength!

"What's a matter, princess? Did an unworthy brat catch your tongue?" Laharl smirked.

"Um... Laharl... laying it a bit thick, aren't you?" Buds asked.

"MWAHAHAHAHA! You made the first mistake in challenging your betters, little princess," the squinty-eyed Uzumaki declared, ignoring his brother. "You're not even worth fighting... weakling!"

"Weakling, am I?" Ami muttered, standing straight, now fully recovered. "I'll give you one thing... I underestimated you. It won't happen again."

"What are you going to do? Cry for mommy or daddy?" Laharl smirked, and laughed aloud again.

"No... this."

Buds didn't know what happened... a flash of light momentarily blinded him, and Laharl shouted as he was pushed away through three trees, leaving smoldering wood pieces around the area. When the flash subsided, and Buds didn't see his brother standing, he got worried.

"Laharl!" he shouted, running towards the smoking crater of the forest, quick to notice the air around the area was charged, even stinging somewhat as he approached... but before he could even see whether the squinty-eyed Uzumaki was alive or not, he felt the air cut around his back, and immediately rolled away, dodging two kunais thrown at his way.

"Wha..." Buds couldnt finish the sentence as he rolled away, dodging another flurry of kunai and shuriken coming at him. Everywhere he went, Ami threw her weapons at him, each accurately trying to disable him.

"Hey! Come on! Your fighting Laharl!" he called from behind a tree. It was imbedded immediately with shurikens.

"I am fighting both of you," Ami stated calmly. "Now that your arrogant brother is down, you are next. Stop cowering behind that tree. Fight me like a man."

"There is no reason to fight you, you know..." Buds muttered. "And as a sensible man... I'm staying here."

"Your choice..."

Another spike in chakra got Buds attention. Throwing caution in the wind, he looked back towards the kunoichi, and realized what that flash of light was. On her hands, chakra gathered and formed into a bright blue-white electrical energy, and then she positioned her hands, each stretched towards him, touching together. One hand then began pulling back, and the electrical energies around her hand formed a c-shaped arc facing away from him.

It was a bow made of electricity. Realizing what she was about to do, Buds ran away from the tree as she launched a large lightning arrow towards his direction, smashing two trees at its course.

"ARE YOU NUTS!?" Buds shouted, running as Ami didn't seem content in that one attack, but kept firing more and more bolts of electrical arrows at the running Uzumaki.

"Keep running, and you'll lose ground," she stated rather neutrally, firing more arrows. "I can keep doing this forever. All I have to do is wait for you to make a mistake-"

"And all I need is an opening!"

Laharl's voice cut through the air... it gave Buds a relief, while for Ami, it gave her another surprise as she found herself on the receiving end of two sandals to her gut. Had the squinty-eyed Uzumaki not shouted his attack, it would have hit her full on, and may well have put her out of commission.

Still... his raw strength made her fall back in retreat, so she distanced herself from the boy, and threw her kunais and shurkens on his way, which was met by a quick movement of the air around her target.

Laharl smirked as all the thrown weapons were deflected away, and looked towards Buds, who was now standing in front of him, his wooden sword somewhat damaged yet usable after blocking all the projectiles rather easily.

"Thanks..." he muttered.

"Don't worry about it," Buds muttered, looking a bit angry. "I owe her some anyways. She almost fried my ass, you know..."

Laharl, from his position and had to stifle laughter as he could see that the backside of Buds' pants was now smoking slightly.

"Yeah, yeah, lap it up," his brother growled. "Let's do this."

"Let's."

Morino Ami kept silent, wondering what to make of this. It was glaringly obvious how the brothers operated... Laharl had the inhuman endurance; he was able to survive an accelerated descent, hitting the ground face on... she could still see the small crater that was formed where he had kissed the ground. Then there was also that lightning arrow that he took full force, and now he's up and about again?

Never forgetting his strength as well, she deduced that Laharl was the tank... able to take and give hits, but his fighting form was glaring. He was too dependent on his might and stamina... unlike the other Uzumaki, who had shown considerable form with that wooden sword of his. How good was he?

That question was answered when the brothers were on her. Easily dodging Laharl's rather pathetic offense, she thought she could take advantage of his openings and sent a kick towards the boy's gut, only for her attack to be blocked with a hard hit from a wooden sword. Buds it seems, was covering for his brother, and parried her attacks, trying to destroy her form to leave her open for Laharl.

_Close combat is suicide for me against these two... _she thought with relative calm, though her temper was rising at the notion that she was being forced to use this.

Pushed away again, she called forth another electrical charge that began to swim around her arms. Like a blur, her hands dove towards her belt in her miniskirt, and grabbed out the scalpel hooks she had yet to use, and threw them up in the air.

Buds paused slightly, wondering what she was going to do, and was surprised when he noticed the scalpels being hit by electrical bolts, and floated in the air.

"Wha...!"

Before he could say anything, the scalpels around Ami suddenly charged towards him. Raising his wooden blade, he tried to parry them out of the way, but was shocked to find that the hooked scalpels moved away from his blocking motion as if they were alive, and hooked on the damaged part of his weapon, and without effort, completely broke it in one motion.

Deeming the disarmed Uzumaki harmless for now, Ami's eyes went towards Laharl, who was charging at her, and as response, moved her hands to motion the scalpels to move at incredible speed towards him. The boy tried to dodge, but like earlier, the scalpels seemed to come alive, and followed his movements.

"ARGH!" Laharl growled as he covered himself as the kunoichi's weapons came at him, cutting his clothes, arms, and even legs, and to make it worse, it came with a follow up attack at his back, pushing the squinty-eyed Uzumaki down on the ground.

"One down..." Ami muttered, raising her hand. The scalpels followed her motion, and went up, and pointed downwards to the prone Uzumaki, who didn't know what was about to hit him.

"Omega Del Atla!" Buds raised his hand, his finger now focusing on his magics as he spoke Latin again. "Mother Earth, protect your children! Earth Coffin!"

Ami looked towards the other Uzumaki, his hands now directed towards his brother. She wondered what language that was, and what good it was going to do as her hand descended. The scalpels rained down from their position, and hit... nothing.

Her eyes widened.

Buds retracted his hands. He could feel the ground beneath him shift towards him, and then, a large dome appeared in front of him, gave way, revealing the fallen Laharl, who was now dirtier now that he took a subterranean route towards his brother.

"Don't do that without warning me again..." the squinty-eyed Uzumaki declared, though he looked relieved.

Buds smirked somewhat, and the two brothers looked towards Ami, who was staring them, her eyebrow raised inquiringly. She had never seen such an earth element ninjutsu... activated by words, not by hand seals, and the energy she had felt was close enough to be chakra but was subtly different.

"Odd... interesting... fascinating..." she stated, her hand going towards her chin. "A sort of bloodline, maybe? Doesn't matter... now that you revealed it, I shall be ready for it."

"That isn't the only thing he can do..." Laharl smirked, as he looked towards Buds. "Time to ask Mother Earth for gifts, mage..." he whispered the last word, inaudible to Ami.

Buds knew what he meant, and nodded. "Give me time. Omega Del Atla!"

Morino Ami found herself feeling a sense of foreboding doom as that Uzumaki boy chanted those words again with that strange language... but unlike the quick hymn, he was deliberate and slow with his words. The chakra-like energy than began to build up once again... she didn't want to know what she was about to receive, and directed all her attacks towards Buds.

"Oh no you don't!" Laharl growled, smirking as he blocked all incoming scalpels head on, ignoring the wounds he was receiving. "You're not spoiling the surprise!"

"Damn..." Ami moved her hands around, manipulating her weapons once again, hoping to get a hit in, but the squinty-eyed Uzumaki blocked every move she did as behind him, the build-up of that odd chakra reinforced and then began to release itself around the area.

"Thank you, Earth Mother, as we receive your gifts..." Buds' spoke in Greek, much notably slower than his Latin. "Bounty of Gaia, tempered by Hephaestus and Kronos... may my enemies fall by your blades!"

Laharl saw Buds nod towards him, smirked and charged towards the kunoichi, abandoning his role of being his brother's shield. Ami's mind began to think the implications... what tactics would the two would use?

Deciding to finish her original plan of taking out Buds, she 'ordered' the scalpels to hit him, and immediately released her control of her weapons. She then concentrated on the charging Uzumaki... gathering electrical energies in her hands, she readied herself.

Without Buds to cover for him, Laharl's sloppy fighting style would be his downfall.

A sound of her metal scalpels hitting something hard and bouncing away surprised her, and noticed that Buds was now holding another sword... though unlike his wooden sword, which was curved somewhat at the tip (like a samurai's sword), this one was uniform, straight and made of... dirt?

"Laharl!" Buds declared, throwing the sword high up in the air.

Ami's eyes widened as she watched the purple haired Uzumaki jumped from his position, up to the air, grabbed the sword, and gathered chakra from his body and smirked as he faced her...

"Winged Slayer!"

Almost as fast as a bolt of lightning, he charged towards her, his blade up front, destroying everything it touched and more as he slid down to the ground. The force of his attack was so strong it, ripped her jacket to shreds, ruining it, and forced her away, to Buds' awaiting form.

"Omega Del Atla!" Buds chanted once again in Latin. "Earth Capture!"

The ground gave way, and suddenly, dirt spiraled up and caught the kunoichi in the air, and dragged her back to the ground, pinning, hardening and trapping her in place. Ami could struggle for a moment, trying to get out of her bonds, but no matter what she did, she couldn't budge.

"Don't bother," Buds declared behind her. "You're beaten."

* * *

From above the treetops, Asuka Goh studied his new team with scrutiny, without showing much emotion. This was probably the first two genins who showed guts and potential as they faced off against the fifteen year old kunoichi, though he wondered how would that fare for Morino Ami; she was now trapped in an interesting earth elemental technique, made by that Uzumaki Tenshin.

"Interesting..." stated a voice behind Goh.

"Quite... Kakashi-sempai," the jounin-sensei replied, without looking to see who it was. "Though too destructive. A ninja must not leave any sign."

"True enough," Kakashi stated, his hand going towards his chin. "But there are times that power can be used as a theatrical means." He paused. "What do you think of the two Uzumakis?"

"That Tenshin boy has a lot of battle potential... odd earth elemental techniques, and solid kenjutsu," Goh closed his eyes for a moment. "Laharl, though... a powerhouse. While his unarmed fighting style leaves much to be desired, he has displayed some skill with the sword on his last attack. And they both work well together."

"Ara... I guess the question is, can the three work together as a team?"

"My guess would be it will fall in the hands of Ami-san," Goh replied. "By the way, Kakashi-sempai... when are you going to get your students?"

The Copycat Ninja looked confused for a moment, and then scratched his silver hair nervously. "Mah... I forgot."

Goh rolled his eyes as Kakashi left him alone to get his students, and continued to watch the Uzumakis and Morino Ami.

* * *

"MWAHAHAHAHA!" Laharl laughed, looking at the trapped kunoichi, the sword he had used was now crumbling away. "Was that it? Your promise of pain? Looks like the little princess has taken on more than she can swallow!"

"Eh, Laharl, come on, don't tease her," Buds muttered.

"I'm not teasing," the squinty-eyed Uzumaki declared. "I'm gloating."

"Your arrogance is the worse," Ami muttered, still held in place by the spell that Buds had cast on her.

"Ooh, the dog without teeth just barks... you hear that, Buds? Hear that sound?" Laharl paused, putting a hand on his ear. "That is the sound of the sore loser."

"I will admit I lost this round... but it won't happen again," Ami stated, looking towards Laharl. "You'd do well to kill now or I'm coming back for both of you... and this time the gloves will be off."

"No, no, no my dear sore loser," Laharl smirked, approaching the trapped Ami. "There won't be a next time... because now, we'll see if this book will be useful."

The kunoichi's eyes widened as Laharl showed a black book titled **Exhilaration of Pain** in his hand. Buds looked puzzled how his brother got it.

"How?" he asked.

"Found it on the ground," the ex-Overlord shrugged. "Must have fallen out when her jacket got ripped."

"Stop fooling around!" Ami growled, now renewing her struggle with her bonds, showing signs of agitation. "Give me back that book!"

Laharl looked at her rather evilly, and towards the book. He nodded.

"Oh, I will give you back the book..." he declared, opening it. "One chapter at a time..."

"No! LEAVE IT ALONE!" Ami shouted. "RELEASE ME! GIVE THAT BACK!"

"Whoa, chill," Buds declared, patting the pinned kunoichi on the back nervously. "Don't worry, Ami-san... I don't think he's going to hurt you, really... right Laharl?"

Buds looked towards his brother, who was staring at the open book. Noting the utterly confused look at Laharl's face, he approached him.

"What's got you dazed? The book can't be that bad... can i... wha... What. The. Hell...?"

The brown haired Uzumaki was now looking at the page that Laharl was staring at... now he realized what had stunned his ex-Overlord brother. He expected paragraphs describing the fine art of torture, interrogation and whatever Morino Ami was supposed to have been threatening them with...

What they got was something else entirely.

"Is... is this... Love Hina?" Buds asked, his eyes going towards Ami, who was now looking away, her cheeks flushing like ripened red tomatoes.

"Uh... no, I mean, yes, but... uh..." she spluttered, her calm facade fading to non-existence. The brothers fought a hardened genin, with powerful moves and techniques... now, she seemed like she wanted to melt into the ground, her face looking like she wanted to disappear.

"It is... isn't it?" Buds asked again.

"It's not mine! A friend of mines just lent it to me! I thought it was interesting, so I was only reading a bit!" Ami said rather fast. "It's not what you think!"

"Oh... well.. if it isn't yours, then, I guess its okay if I do this... right?" Laharl asked, and began to dangle the book, holding it up by a page.

"NOOO! Don't do that! IT'S A SPECIAL EDITION VOLUME, SIGNED BY AKAMATSU-SENSEI HIMSELF! THERE ARE ONLY 5 OF THEM IN THE WORLD!"

Laharl and Buds looked at each other knowingly.

"I think she's... yeah?"

"Yup... definitely."

"I am not what you're thinking... whatever it is!" Ami growled, struggling against her bonds once more.

"If you're not, then tell me... what's the name of the ultimate form of a Shinigami's blade at Bleach?" Buds asked.

"You mean the Ban..." Ami stopped. Her eyes glazed as she stared at the two brothers, and began to struggle again. "I am going to kill you both... I promise! I will kill you both!"

"She's digging her own grave," Buds stated, feeling rather sorry for her.

"Heh... little princess is some otaku!" Laharl teased, flipping the book he was holding up and down at her face. "Little princess is an otaku..."

"You just love to pour gasoline on a fire, don't you?" Buds asked.

"Fire! Now that is a good idea!" the squinty-eyed Uzumaki smirked, dangling the book again by a page, his fingers holding a corner. "A nice bonfire would do this book... oh, wait... this manga, some good, whatcha think? Eh? Eh?"

**RIP!**

"Oh..." Laharl paused, seeing the book fall to the ground... and on his finger was a piece of the corner of the page he had been holding earlier. "Oops."

"**Oops!?"**

Voice laced in venom... the area now silent as it was bathed in killing intent... Buds shivered as he looked towards the shaking kunoichi, whose head was down, and around her began to glow so brightly underneath her bonds.

"Oh... bugger..." was all Buds could say before everything exploded into a white light. Everything after that was blank... he was momentarily blinded once again, and his ears rang.

Laharl readied himself, but his surroundings were nothing more than white noise. He didn't even know if he was standing or on the ground. He felt disconnected from his body… until a strong and painful lightning attack hit him on the stomach, shoulder, face, and chest.

He could only scream in agony.

"**How did that feel!? Good, doesn't it!? And now…"**

Buds heard the painful screams of his brother, and tried to pin-point his location, but before he could do anything, someone punched his gut multiple times before grabbing his neck, and pinning him to a tree.

The smoke cleared, and Buds, in agony, could finally see who was holding him... it was Morino Ami. Her left gloved hand was squeezing his neck, while her right hand, ungloved, was crackling with electrical-blue light. She was shaking, looking at him with water in her eyes.

"I'm going to kill you..." she declared, her tears falling freely. "You know my secret... I can't let you ruin me..."

Buds could only twitch weakly as he tried to get in air. "H... hold on...! Ca... can't breathe...!"

"You think I'm weird don't you!? You think I'm weird!" she cried, shaking him more. "Most shinobis aren't interested in stuff like this... comedy, romance, fantasy... what use is this kids stuff when you're facing life and death everyday?"

"Y... you're... you're not weird..." Buds gasped. "I... I think its... normal..."

"Liar! You're lying so I won't kill you!"

"No... seriously..." he groaned. "I'm like yo... agh!"

Buds began to twitch as her grip tightened. In the corner of his eye, he could see Laharl, alive, but somehow rigid, his limbs twitching. Whatever Ami did to his brother, it put him out commission for a while... Laharl wasn't going to be helping him anytime soon.

He could only laugh weakly, and Ami looked at him, confused.

"Hey... if you're going to kill me..." Buds coughed. "... can you at least... tell me what happened in this week's JUMP Weekly? I missed... it..."

Morino Ami looked towards Uzumaki Tenshin, surprised at what he said. She loosened her grip, sending him to the ground, coughing hard, taking in all the air that he could, and she moved away. Spotting her glove for her right hand on the ground, she picked it up with her left, and shoved it to her lightning hand, covering it.

"Done?"

Ami turned towards the voice. It was Goh, who was looking at her neutrally. She wiped the tears from her face, and it transformed once again to her calm facade, though her eyes gave it away.

"Yes..." she replied.

"Good," Goh looked towards the coughing Buds, and towards the twitching Laharl. "When you both recover, we'll start introductions."

* * *

Back at the academy, Naruto grinned (Sakura, inwardly, did as well) as the door swung open, and a jounin with broom-like silver hair poked his head inside, only to suddenly be drenched in a bucket of cold water.

"Nyahahaha! I can't believe you fell for that!" Naruto laughed aloud, clutching his stomach.

"Uh... sorry, sensei... I tried to stop him..." Sakura began, though inside, her Inner Sakura was clapping strongly for Naruto.

_Tch... is this really a jounin? _Sasuke thought darkly, not impressed with the man.

"Hoh... my first impression is..." Kakashi paused. "I don't like you guys."

"Tough talk from a wet scarecrow!" the blonde Uzumaki rolled on the floor, laughing.

"Says the blonde monkey in an orange jumpsuit..." the jounin replied.

"Blonde monkey...!?" Naruto asked, looking shocked. He grinned manically. "You're on my hit list, scarecrow."

"Hnh... meet upstairs in the rooftops," Kakashi declared, ignoring Naruto's threat, and left them.

* * *

Buds, Laharl, and Ami sat side by side; Laharl on the left, glaring daggers at Ami, who was on the right, back to her calm self once more, and Buds sandwiched in-between the two. Their jounin sensei, Goh, was in front of them, looking at them through his small eyes, though the brown-haired Uzumaki thought that the jounin was smiling underneath that mouth mask.

"Now that you three have had a taste of one another..." Laharl glared at Ami, who looked at him disdainfully, much to Goh's amusement. "Its time for some introductions."

Goh put his hand at his chest. "I am Asuka Goh. I like experimenting with ninjutsu, and challenging missions. I dislike loudmouths..." and he looked towards Laharl at that point, "and traitors. My dream is to train worthy shinobi.

"Your turn, Ami-san," Goh finished.

"Fine. Morino Ami... My likes are none of your business..."

"Like we need to know what other series' of 'kiddy books' you like," Laharl growled, earning Ami's glare.

"I dislike arrogant brats who can't fight their way off a paper bag," she leered towards the squinty-eyed Uzumaki. Buds just rolled his eyes. "And my dream... well... truthfully, is also none of your business."

"Fair enough," Goh nodded. "Uzumaki Laharl?"

"Yeah, yeah..." Laharl nodded. "Uzumaki Laharl, ex-Overlord extraordinaire. I like beating down overconfident little princesses..."

"Do you really want me to repeat your 'beat down'?" Ami asked, her eyes narrowing.

"Oh, come on guys," Buds declared, keeping the peace between the two. "Let's just get the introductions done without another war... okay?"

"Tche," Laharl growled. "My dislikes are none of your concern, and neither are my dreams."

"Alright. Uzumaki Tenshin?"

"Uh... Buds. Please call me Buds," the brown-haired Uzumaki said with a smile. "I like my brothers, and... uh... well..." his thoughts went towards Hinata. "I also like cooking, and learning more recipes. I dislike a lot of things... my dream is to... uh..." and his thoughts went back towards Hyuga Hinata again. "Y... yeah."

"Interesting," Goh declared after a while, realizing Buds had finished his introduction. Standing up, he continued, "Now that we know each other, we can officially call this Team 9. Congratulations, you two," he looked towards the Uzumakis. "You are now officially genins of Konoha. I shall discuss our training options tomorrow, and the day after that we shall take missions.

"Now... dismissed!"

Goh stood up, bowed slightly while he formed a hand seal, and disappeared from their sight. Laharl looked towards Ami, who stood up first from the group, and ignored them. After ten paces, she looked back towards Buds, who was now laughing somewhat towards his brother.

"Hey..." she called. "Tenshin."

"Uh... Buds!" he corrected her.

"Yeah, whatever..." she muttered. "I'll bring my JUMP tomorrow. You can borrow it... just don't ruin it."

Buds was taken aback, and then smiled widely, expressing his thanks with a deep bow. Morino Ami ignored him, turned her back at them, and walked away.

"Hehe... are you gonna betray Hinata now?" Laharl leered.

"Nah..." Buds grinned towards his brother. "So shut up, or I'm telling Naruto you got your ass handed to you by a girl."

"We won, and you know it," the squinty-eyed Uzumaki growled.

"Maybe..." his brother replied. "So... can you stand...?"

"Nope..."

"Me neither..." Buds stated.

The two Uzumakis fell on their backs looking at the sky, clutching their injuries, moaning in pain on the training grounds.

**To Be Continued...**

* * *

**Omake:**

"Damn it… stupid Uzumaki…" Ami growled as she pinned her manga on both sides, forcing it to stay open. She grabbed some scotch tape and the ripped part of her manga (which she recovered from Laharl), and meticulously tried to connect the two broken pieces together.

"Apologies to Akamatsu-sensei…" she muttered, bowing towards the manga. "Maybe I shouldn't have taken you out of my room… but I wouldn't have anything to read if those idiots didn't show up."

Ami looked somewhat miffed at how everything played out. She supposed that she was unprepared with her foe as usually her threats and her name would give the usual green genins a scare powerful enough to make them run. Now, she was in a team again, after 2 years of doing nothing with that oddball Asuka Goh.

She snorted. Didn't the man even feel shame that his last name was a woman's name? Maybe that's the reason why he seemed a bit too… apathetic. His childhood must have consisted of his schoolmates teasing him, calling him 'Asuka-chan'.

She would have. It was a joke you shouldn't miss telling.

"Ami-san…"

"AGH!" the kunoichi screamed as Goh appeared from her window, her hand going for her weapon holster, only to hear a very… very painful ripping sound.

Beads of sweat began to pour down her face as she looked towards her manga. She had been in the final process of fixing the tear, and now after her jounin-sensei scared her, the rip had increased in size.

She screeched.

"Hmmm… must be a bad time," Goh decalred softly, before disappearing.

Ami cursed, and threw her shurikens towards the window. She swore… he did that in purpose.

* * *

**Additional Notes: **

**(1) - **_described last chapter._

* * *

**Next: **

_Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura, and Uchiha Sasuke are now taking Kakashi's Bell test to show that they are worthy of being kept as genin... but, unfortunately, for the jounin, Naruto already knows what the test holds, and is planning something to give a little something back. _

* * *

**Author's Notes: **

_No love or reviews for the last chapter? T.T_

_XD Before anyone complains about Naruto not being much on the last two chapters, well, yeah... sorry about that, but this one was necessary to introduce Team 9. Next is all Naruto... the fox prankster is back! :P _

_And thanks for Nadia for editing and proof-reading this for me. _


	6. Chapter 6

**Team 7: Forget the Bells! Grab the Book! **

* * *

Uzumaki Naruto yawned. He scratched his earlobe. Then he scratched his head. He moaned a moment as he was sitting side by side with his teammates, feeling somewhat bored with the short walk he had, going from classroom to roof.

It was only a few minutes, but the whole world suddenly turned somewhat dull without Laharl and Buds.

"Now that we are all here, let's have an introduction," Kakashi called. "Your name, likes, dislikes, and dreams. Alright... let's start!"

Sakura looked somewhat confused and nervous. "Um, sensei... why don't you give us an example?"

"Alright... sure," Kakashi declared, and began introducing himself while Naruto's mind went to other places... mainly his thoughts of his teammates.

There was Uchiha Sasuke, a. k. a., Chicken Butt. Name was derived after realizing that a chicken's feathered buttocks looks like the bastard's little pretty head. He has two, and apparently only two goals... to sleep with women to keep his clan from dying, and to kill Uchiha Itachi... his brother. However, apparently, he has no interest in women now... or probably ever, so he'll be gunning after his brother first.

Haruna Sakura... a. k. a. Natural Pinky. Her family is one of the few ninjas that have pink hair, like how Naruto, out of the three Uzumaki brothers, was the only one who has the whiskers (Buds and Laharl have expressed gratitude over that). Her life-long dream is to annoy Sasuke to death. Why? Only the gods know. Apparently, it's some ritual in Konoha where academic girls try to mark their territory all over one boy... the only one who seemed not interested in playing that game was Hinata.

Then there's that Hatake Kakashi, a. k. a. Orange Book Lover. Naruto only remembered just one thing about the man... he was an ass. Seriously... the man took a team, talked about teamwork and when it mattered, his focus only went to one student. Yup... one student. Two guesses on who, but you only need one.

"Alright... you're next, blonde monkey," Kakashi's voice declared.

Naruto's mind was still on his memories of his teammates, practically ignoring his sensei. He sighed, as he knew his thoughts were somewhat unbecoming of him. Hadn't he learned to let go of petty squabbling and unnecessary hate over the past hundred years or so? Didn't before he began traveling around Universes, Hatake Kakashi was one of the few who had supported him when all faith around Naruto was falling down? Didn't Haruno Sakura mature under the tutelage of Tsunade, who at that time, was the Gondaime Hokage. While Sasuke was still an ass... they at least respected each other in the end, didn't they?

"Oi... dobe!" Sasuke called. "You're lagging us."

"Yeah... get with the program, stupid!" Sakura growled, and hit Naruto on the back of his head.

The blonde Uzumaki fell, his face hitting the floor and kicking him out of his reverie. His head rose slowly, his whole body shaking. There was a slight unnerving moment for the whole team when he began chuckling rather darkly... then, as quickly as it came, his evil chuckle disappeared when he laughed aloud.

"Nya, nya!" Naruto smiled as he sat back up, scratching the back of his head. "Sorry 'bout that! I'm Uzumaki Naruto! I like my brothers... Laharl for the pranks, and Buds for the food. I like ramen as well! I also like... uh... someone..." he paused. "I dislike asses, bastards, and snakes! And that super slow three minutes for cup-ramen to cook! My dream is to find a certain person... and... oh yeah. Become Hokage!"

Hataka Kakashi had heard a lot in his life...motives of revenge, the kunoichi having a heavy crush on her teammate, a shinobi who would either want a girl or get stronger than a rival... but none as ambitious as Naruto's claim to become Hokage. And to make it even more ridiculous, he said it in a half-assed way, it was almost a last thought.

"Interesting bunch," Kakashi declared, now that all introductions were over. "Now that we all know each other, tomorrow, we're going to partake in missions."

Sakura looked between themselves, and raised her hand. "Ano... what kind of missions, sensei?"

"First, we are doing something we can do with just the four of us," Kakashi explained, his tone now going somewhat serious."

"Like... what?" Naruto asked, knowing full well what Kakashi was going to say.

"Survival training."

"Why is our first mission... training?" Sakura asked, a bit confused. "We did enough training at the academy."

"This isn't normal training," Kakashi replied.

"Not... normal?"

It was Kakashi's turn to chuckle darkly as Sakura asked that question, scaring the kunoichi.

"What's so funny, sensei?" Sakura asked nervously.

"Hehe... its not really that funny, but when you guys here this... you'll flip," Kakashi's eyes closed, and his mouth mask forming a crease.

Naruto guessed that the jounin was smirking.

"Of twenty-seven graduates, only nine will be chosen as genin," Kakashi declared. "The rest-"

"PIUUUU! Wrong!" Naruto suddenly declared, forming an X with his arms. Kakashi, Sakura, and even Sasuke blinked at surprise at his sudden reaction. "You're wrong sensei!"

"Oh?" the jounin asked. "I'm wrong, blonde monkey?"

"Hehe... and you call yourself a jounin!" Naruto stood up. "First of all... there are twenty-nine graduates!" and he smirked. "And if you think that my brother's and I won't make it to genin... think again, scarecrow!"

"Hoh? Optimistic, aren't we?" Kakashi seemed to smile once more. "Say hi to your brothers for me when you see them back at the academy."

"Wha... academy?" Sakura asked.

"Let me continue before I was interrupted," the jounin cleared his throat. "Of twenty-se… uh, nine graduates, only nine will ever have a chance to become genin. The rest will be sent back to the academy. This training I'm about to spring will be a highly difficult test with a failure of sixty-six percent."

Out of the three genins in Team 7, only Sakura's face changed, looking disbelieved.

"B-but... we worked hard!" Sakura declared, sitting straight up. "Why did we graduate in the first place?"

"Oh, that was just to select those who have a chance to become genin," Kakashi chuckled. "Told you guys would flip."

"Eh...!?" Sakura groaned softly, looking somewhat pale and sickly. Her thoughts of being separated from her crush was sloshing in her head like a tidal wave to the shore.

Sasuke, while his face stayed the same, his hands were noticeably shaking.

Naruto entertained himself by picking on his nose.

"Tomorrow, you will be graded on the training field," the jounin declared. "Bring all your equipment, and assemble at five in the morning. Dismissed."

Kakashi seemed poised to leave, but then, turned back towards his students.

"Oh... and skip breakfast," he muttered. "You'll throw up."

"I call BS!" Naruto smirked. Kakashi's narrowed at his response, but said no more, and jumped away from view, leaving Team 7 alone.

"Well, see you guys tomorrow," the blonde Uzumaki declared, waving his hands towards Sakura and Sasuke, and left them alone. He was pretty sure that the Pinky would ask Chicken Butt for a date, and get rejected for it.

Outside, Naruto took it slow for the first time, not really rushing to get home. His thoughts were getting darker as everything suddenly seemed to pile up in his head… it was rather funny, to him, that just earlier, he was about to behave civilly towards his team, knowing full well that they would grow up out of their current attitudes.

However, those little insults from Kakashi and Sasuke with the hit from Sakura (who also insulted him, by the way) was the last straw. Before he realized it, he was kissing the floor, the dark chuckle escaping his lips while his mind just screamed for one thing.

_PRANK THEM! PRANK THEM! _

Oh yes... why wait until the inevitable growth and maturity, when they are acting like a bunch of asses, bastards and annoyances right now? He chuckled once again, feeling the dark emotions rising from his chest. It became louder and louder, garnering the attention of almost all the people in the area. They stared at him rather nervously.

_Let tomorrow come… and they will fear the Prankster! _Naruto thought, finally laughing out loud.

"And you say my laugh is annoying."

The blonde Uzumaki blinked in surprise, and saw Laharl and Buds, supporting each other on the corner of the street. Their respective clothes were torn, burnt and dirty, and their faces were bruised enough to warrant some concern from the blonde Uzumaki.

"You guys look like crap," Naruto declared.

"Not only do we look like crap... but we feel like crap as well," Buds replied, noticeably cheery.

"And any reason why you're... happy?" Naruto asked.

"Well... according to our sensei, we are now officially part of Team 9," he brown-haired Uzumaki declared.

"What happened?" the blonde asked.

"Survival training," Laharl declared, before Buds could open his mouth. He didn't trust the blabbermouth to shut it about Ami beating them (though they won, he insisted). "Special survival training."

"Meh," Naruto growled. "Our survival training's tomorrow. The bell test most probably..."

"Well, you already know what to do, right?" Buds stated as the three began to walk home. "Just ask the pinky, and the emo to team up with you..."

"No."

"Huh?" the brown-haired Uzumaki looked at his brother, confused. "No? No to what exactly?"

"I'm not going to ask Pinky and Chicken Butt to team up with me..." Naruto smirked somewhat. "I'm going to do something a wee bit... different."

Laharl and Buds knew that smirk very well.

"I am going to prank them."

Oh yes, the two brothers thought. The Prankster's been brought forth. May God have mercy on the poor wenches' souls. Rest in Peace. And all that she-bang.

* * *

Sakura moaned as she rubbed her empty stomach. Kakashi had told Team 7 to meet him at the training grounds at five in the morning, and it was now eleven. Damn the teacher, her inner thoughts growled, fuming that the jounin was very, very, very late... she was at her last straw. Thoughts of wanton murder, decapitation and castration entered her head, bubbling forth like boiling water... but she could never show her thoughts. Never! Not when Sasuke was there.

Too bad Uchiha Sasuke was too busy to even notice the girl. He was sitting under a tree, pretending to be rather unemotional, though if one looked carefully, his eyes ticked every once in a while, his pinky flexing somewhat. His bottom was also now unfeeling... he had been sitting at the same spot for four hours already. His thoughts too, were on his jounin-sensei, and like Sakura, it was dark and promising of pain.

Oddly enough, the only other person who was absent, other than Kakashi, was Naruto. The blonde 'dead last' hadn't appeared since their separation yesterday, and they didn't care much on his absence. Sakura welcomed it, more out of the fact she was left along with her crush, and Sasuke as well, though in his case, felt there were less people dragging him down.

"YO! Pinky! Chicken Butt!"

Sakura and Sasuke were surprised to hear Naruto's voice calling them. They easily spotted the orange-wearing Uzumaki as he approached them, waving his left arm. As he came closer, a sweet, appetizing smell wafted through the training grounds, making the pink-haired shinobi and the raven-haired Uchiha remembered how hungry they were.

It wasn't a good sensation... and to make it even worse, the aroma came from Naruto, who had a dango stick sticking out of his lips.

"Nya... Buds was right... dango's good," the blonde Uzumaki declared, smacking his lips with satisfaction. His two teammates could only follow his actions with careful eyes.

"Naruto!" Sakura suddenly declared, clutching her stomach. "You're late! And why have you eaten!? Did you forget what Kakashi-sensei said?"

"What... did I miss training?" he asked.

"Uh... no..." the kunoichi replied.

"Then I'm not late!" Naruto smirked at her, and patted her back, ignoring her mad-stricken face when he made contact. He smiled towards Sasuke, who ignored him, and smacked his lips once more. "Ahhh... never had a more satisfying breakfast! My brother is a mean cook... he has this fried rice mixed with caramelized onions and roasted garlic, plus the way he can make a great corned beef is just astounding!"

Sakura groaned once more as her stomach made that growling sound, wanting to be fed. Sasuke looked stoic... until his also began to grumble.

"And the smell... oh my God. You cannot believe how great it smells," the blonde Uzumaki continued, ignoring the killing intent that surrounded him as his two teammates' eyes became red and dangerous. He seemed even more oblivious to the fact that they had gotten their kunais out, ready to stab him at the back.

"Hoh... seems everybody's here."

Kakashi's voice snapped Sakura and Sasuke out of their funk as the three genins of Team 7 looked up from the tree, and saw their jounin sensei smiling down on them.

"YOU'RE LATE, DAMNIT!" Sakura snapped, her anger shifting from the blonde Uzumaki to Kakashi. "WHAT TOOK YOU!?"

"Mah, mah," Kakashi waved at the kunoichi's anger. "I was lost on the road of life."

"LIAR!" Sakura declared.

"I call BS again!" Naruto muttered at the same time.

"Heh..." the jounin smirked, looking somewhat amused. "Now that I'm here... its time to get on with the test."

Kakashi approached the three wooden posts in the middle of the field, and placed an alarm clock on top of the middle one. Sasuke and Sakura looked curious as Kakashi then began to extract two bells from his pockets. Naruto rolled his eyes... he knew it was coming.

"Today's task..." the jounin flexed his fingers a bit, making the bells ring, "is to take these two bells from me before noon. Those who cannot get a bell by noon do not get lunch."

Sakura made a noise.

"And for fun... I'll not only tie you to one of those posts, but I'll eat right in front of you."

Sasuke's face was bloated with annoyance and anger, much to Naruto's enjoyment, while Sakura clutched her stomach, which began rumbling again.

"No fair, sensei! Naruto ate!" Sakura glowered.

"Is that true?" Kakashi asked the blonde.

"Yup," Naruto replied. "A ninja must always be prepared! Plus, I called you on BS."

"Oh... interesting," Kakashi declared, his eyes narrowing.

"Uh... wait!" Sakura declared, as a thought hit her. "Why are there only two bells?"

"Hmmm..." and the jounin smirked underneath his mask. "Because there are two, one of you will definitely be tied to a post. Also... that person fails."

Sakura's eyes widened, and Sasuke's narrowed.

"See? I'm very kind. At least, only one of you will be sent back to the academy," Kakashi declared, enjoying every minute it. "But remember... it could just be one... but it could all be three. Use anything on your arsenal. You won't even come close to getting it without intending to kill me."

Sakura looked worried. "But... sensei... you couldn't even dodge a bucket of water! You'd be in danger!"

"Your loss then, Pinky," the jounin declared. "Would be quite a comeback in the academy... especially when you were beaten by Mr. Dead Last blonde monkey here."

"I'm so going to kick your ass, scarecrow," Naruto growled, his words coming out acidly. His hand dove towards his kunai pocket.

"Sure..." Kakashi's eyes narrowed. "When I say start... ready...?"

Sasuke and Sakura tensed, their legs ready to jump.

"START!"

* * *

Around the training area, concealed so well that not even the animals felt uncomfortable around them, was a unit of Narutos slowly moving from area to area, split in groups. Using hand signals that all of them understood, they began to invade the area, unknown to Kakashi, Sakura, and Sasuke.

In front, one of the Naruto's signaled something towards the others. Nodding, they all then split, and began to move in different directions.

* * *

"Umm... I think you're a bit confused, blonde monkey," Kakashi declared when he saw Naruto standing along in the open when the other two genins hid their presence effectively.

"The only thing that is confused is your hair-style," Naruto smirked. With deliberation, he suddenly charged towards the jounin.

Kakashi, much to his disbelief, wondered how badly this was going to turn out for the Uzumaki. But then again, he was the academy's dead last... and he now saw the reason why. Orange jumpsuit? Quick to anger? Sighing, the jounin then put his hand on left saddle pocket, hoping to intimidate the genin.

He was wrong.

_So... that's where you keep the book! _Naruto smirked.

"First lesson..." Kakashi declared, going for his pockets, but then was forced to shift his body and raise his other arm when a flying kick came from his side.

_What? _the jounin thought. He was then forced again to duck as Naruto did a quick follow-up by twisting in the air, now kicking the jounin with his other foot in a different direction. He missed, but caught himself well, and landed cleanly on the ground, impressing those watching him.

"First lesson is taijutsu," Naruto smirked. "Sorry sensei... but... this lesson, I'm good at!"

What came next was a fast jab towards the jounin's side, which he deflected easily with a slap, but Naruto came back with sweep. Jumping in the air, Kakashi was once again caught by surprise when the sweep followed up with Naruto shifting his whole weight down towards his hands, planting them firmly to the ground, and twisted his waist and legs up in a circular motion.

Naruto felt his feet hit something, as it was almost impossible to dodge attacks from mid-flight, but knew that Kakashi had blocked his attacks using his two hands. He didn't stop his attack as his feet were on the ground once more, his eyes looking towards his target. Spotting the jounin just recovering from his jump, he didn't hesitate, and rushed through.

_Impressive, but... _Kakashi saw an opening. Dodging the reckless haymaker the blonde just used, he got behind him, and formed a Tiger Seal on his hands.

"Ninja's aren't supposed to get caught behind. Konoha Taijutsu Ougi..." the jounin declared. He then shoved his hands right towards Naruto's buttocks. "One Thousand Years of Pain!"

Sasuke, hidden in the tree, could only shake his head at the whole scene as Naruto flew off towards the nearby lake, his hands on his butt. For some reason, the whole seriousness of the fight scene he had just witnessed was just thrown out of the window by one stupid attack.

Sakura could only look with a slight blush. "What the... that wasn't ninjutsu..."

* * *

The Naruto clones were now at the place where Kakashi had hidden the bento lunch boxes, and hid them away, replacing them with another lunch box, almost similar to the ones that they hid away. Some of the Narutos were smirking, while the Naruto leading them looked somber, and signaled them to disperse.

One by one, they popped like balloons, disappearing in a puff of smoke and giving all their memories to the original Naruto, telling him that the deed was done.

* * *

"Hehehe... ninja's aren't supposed to get caught from behind, Sensei..." a Naruto declared, surprising the jounin as he was caught off guard. Kakashi had been too busy focusing on the Naruto clones coming from the water he hadn't caught the one going behind him.

Kakashi could only watch in awe and shock as the Naruto clones charging at him went for his limbs, trapping him in place.

"My ass still hurts from the last attack!" another Naruto declared, jumping towards the air. "Taste my rightful punch!"

Kakashi chuckled quietly as he preformed a kawarimi, grabbing one of the Naruto clones, and moved him to his original position before he hid his presence away towards one of the bushes. He watched as the flying Naruto hit the clone and dispersed at the impact. Hoping to cause a rift of distrust between the clones, he was surprised once more when the Narutos looked at each other, and spread out, disappearing from view.

_Good taijutsu, good head... but he is apparently also quick to anger, and tend to rush things... _Kakashi looked thoughtful. _Could be an act, though... am I underestimating him? _

The jounin's senses alerted him, and he used kawarimi once again as a flurry of kunai and shuriken came at him from a direction.

Up above the trees, Sasuke wondered for a moment if he had caught Kakashi off guard. The jounin had been exposing his back for quite a while, studying the Naruto clones' actions, and when he found the opportune chance to strike, Sasuke took it... only to realize he had been duped when a thick wooden branch came out of the bushes.

Kakashi, hidden away once more, smiled as the Uchiha reacted as the standards called for it... he moved out of position, though by doing so, the jounin could indefinitely follow him. He also sensed Sakura moving out of her hiding place of the bushes, but in a different direction, away from Sasuke.

_I suppose I should take care of the Uchiha first, _Kakashi thought. He could always take care of Sakura later... but that left the dead last on the missing list.

_Oh well... _his thoughts continued. If he ever saw Naruto again, he'll have to make adjustments.

* * *

_Sasuke-kun... where did you go? _Sakura asked mentally as she ran towards the direction where she thought she last saw the boy. She had wanted to see her crush in action, but other than the projectiles he had thrown, the only real battle she had seen so far is that rather impressive taijutsu display of the blonde Uzumaki.

It wasn't really a surprise, but it did come to her as a jolt. The Uzumaki triplets were in fact, favored to become one team at one point for being combat specialists... but that rumor died the day Naruto had failed the test. It was revived, though, when the blonde Uzumaki entered the classroom with his forehead protector, but then, quickly died a natural death when Team 7 was announced.

Before graduation, there were even rumors that Uchiha Sasuke had been interested in fighting one of the Uzumakis... but then, the results of the match were not conclusive. Some say Sasuke had won easily, which Sakura had firmly believed... others say the Uzumakis had rejected the challenge, opting to just spend time at that Ramen stand they usually hung about.

Of course, there were rumors that Sasuke had lost the challenge. Ridiculous though, Sakura thought.

"Ne, ne, Pinky!"

Sakura, shocked, slipped on a wet patch of grass as Naruto suddenly appeared from her side.

"WHAT!?" the pink-haired kunoichi declared as she stood up, and slammed the blonde genin to a tree, her hand on his collar jacket. He just scared the crap out of her, appearing like that out of the blue! "What do you want!?"

"Um... Sakura-chan," Naruto paused a moment, wondering what he wanted to say. "Hey... I was wondering... could we team up?"

"Huh?" Sakura asked, looking surprised. "Team up? Why?"

"Well, frankly... Kakashi's a very good ninja," the blonde Uzumaki declared. "I... I don't think any of us can beat him alone, so I wondered if you'd like to team up. With your brains, and my skills, I'm sure we can both beat him!"

Sakura looked at Naruto as if he grew a new head, impressed at the assessment. Now that he said it, he was right. Nodding, the pink-haired kunoichi smiled.

"Yeah! You're right! I gotta find Sasuke-kun then! Maybe he'll team up with me!" she stated dreamily.

"Uh... what about me?" Naruto asked. This was his plan after all... and he did ask first.

"What about you?" Sakura glowered before turning around, and leave. "Even if I team up with you, we'd lose! You're not Sasuke-kun!"

"But... but Sakura!"

The kunoichi took a few steps away from the blonde, hoping to get a clue where her crush may have went. She was already quite ready to leave Naruto completely alone until she heard a surprised gasp coming from him. And a soft moan.

"Sa... Sakura...!? What are you... umph!"

"Hehe... you're so cute at that age..."

_Wha... that's my voice! _the kunoichi thought.

Slowly sneaking towards the trees, she took a sneak peek towards the blonde Uzumaki, and her eyes widened when she spotted one of the most horrific scenes she had ever seen in her whole life... an image of her likeness licking Naruto.

It was the crudest henge of her. Somewhat taller, older, and a bit meatier on the hips, legs, butt, the older Sakura had probably one of the most humongous pair of breast she has ever seen on any person. What was even worse was that perverted look that the fake Sakura had as she kissed and licked the blonde... pervert!

"You... you sick idiot!" Sakura screamed, coming out of your hiding place. Naruto jumped, seeing two pink-haired kunoichis.

"Sakura!?" he asked, shocked, looking between the younger one and the older one, who faced off the younger one with a small grin. "B-but… who… w-wha…?"

"Well, well... if it isn't my younger self," the older Sakura leered. "God, I remember when I was a pretentious brat like you."

"Save your words, you fake!" Sakura growled, approaching the older Sakura. "You're just some illusion!"

"If I was some illusion... I wouldn't do this," and the older Sakura suddenly grabbed the still shocked Naruto and gave him one of the most erotic kisses that he ever gotten. It was a deep kiss, with implied evidence of tongue, completely draining the blood out of the younger Sakura's face.

Naruto was already knocked out due to shock by the time the older Sakura separated herself from him.

"Well?" the older Sakura asked, gratified.

"Then some transformed clone!" the younger Sakura growled. "And to prove it, I'm gonna show you that these... are fake!"

Her hands flew straight and true towards the older Sakura's chest. As a henge, it was nothing more than an illusion. She was quite sure that her hand would pass through the illusion, and most likely dispel the stupid and perverted game that Naruto was playing... only to be taken aback when her hands were cupping the older Sakura's breast.

Words could not describe how the younger Haruno's mind went from first gear to fifth, stammering words of protest, ordering her opened mouth to say the words, but dying even before reaching half-way. Tongue-tied was the best word to depict it as Sakura's hand removed itself from the older Sakura's globe, shaking like a tree in a wind-storm.

"Im... impossible...!" Sakura finally stated.

"I'm from the future, baka!" the older Sakura exclaimed. "I used the Flux Capacitor no Jutsu from my hubby here," and she points towards the fainted Naruto on the floor, "in the future to travel to the past. I always wanted to see him young once more..."

"Hub... hubby!?"

"Oh yeah... this little boy here grows a thirteen incher!" the older Sakura grinned rather maniacally. "Wish I gave him my virginity. Stupid Sasuke, and his emo three incher. Did you know he was crying like a baby after two minutes of the deed? He didn't even last that long! What the hell was his frigging problem!?"

_**Three incher...**_

_**Crying like a baby...**_

_**Didn't last long...**_

"Lie! LIES! ALL LIES!!"

"My younger self... its no lie that Sasuke was only this big..." and the older Sakura used her thumb and index finger to further emphasize her words. "Naruto meanwhile... is this big..."

The older Sakura then described the length using two of her hands, making an impressive if not impossible length.

"And this thick too," she ended back with her thumb and index finger once more, emphasizing a width almost equal to the length she used to describe Sasuke's... size. "Damn boy broke me literally in just a few seconds... worse still, he's got superhuman stamina. And I loved... every... minute... of it."

"Lie...!" Sakura moaned, backing away from the older Sakura. "I would never... with Naruto!? No! No way!"

"Get used to it, mini-me," the older Sakura smirked. "Cause all of this..." and she slowly slid into a rather sexy dance, her arms going from her head to her legs, "will be Naruto-kun's..."

"**NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" **

Sakura's scream was heard from a few kilometers away. Houses near the training area looked up slightly, wondering if the wind had shifted. For a moment, they thought they heard a blood-curling scream... but then, it could have just been their imagination.

The 'fainted' Naruto opened his eyes, stood up from his position, and walked beside his transformed clone (the older Sakura). He looked towards the newly fainted Sakura, down for the count, while his clone laughed slightly.

"Poor Pinky. She knew how the basic henge worked... too bad she never realized we don't really follow the way the academy had taught it," the clone stated, and held that humongous chest in two hands. "The Uzumaki Perfect Henge no Jutsu!"

The other Naruto looked towards him, and shook his head, frowning.

"You kinda overdid it," he muttered. And he looked towards her again.

"And stop touching those."

* * *

Kakashi and Sasuke both looked up as their heard Sakura scream. The jounin-sensei left easily, somewhat concerned at what happened to the pink-haired kunoichi, while the Uchiha was buried from feet to neck, courtesy of Kakashi's Inner Decapitation Earth Jutsu. And to add more salt to injury, he was given a lecture at the same time.

Needless to say, Uchiha Sasuke was having a very bad day. Moreover, it got even worse when after Kakashi had left him, he heard a chuckle emanating from behind him.

"The last surviving Uchiha!" Naruto declared with a rather arrogant tone.

Sasuke could only guess that he was being approached, with the sound of footsteps getting louder and louder. Soon, he found himself face to face with the blonde, who squatted down, and looked at him with a rather proud smirk on his face.

"You look somewhat _a-head _of the game," the blonde grinned.

"Shut it, dead last," Sasuke muttered softly, though with a bit of intensity. "I don't see you doing any better."

"Yeah… no duh," Naruto shrugged, and became somewhat somber, taking Sasuke by surprise. The Uchiha was expecting more put-downs, but the Uzumaki just looked at him with seriousness, and stated, "We should team up."

Sasuke stared at the blonde for a moment.

"Excuse me?"

"Think about it, teme," the blonde replied. "We are three genins… how can one of us beat a jounin sensei?"

"So…?" Sasuke asked, looking at Naruto with some thought.

"Let's team up," the blonde stated readily, extending his hand towards the Uchiha, neutrally. "You, me, both take him out. I'm sure with my kick-ass taijutsu skills, and your kick-ass fire breathing jutsus with long gay names I can't remember, we can take down some scarecrow with a broom-head any day!"

Other than the small insult towards his fire jutsus, Sasuke knew the blonde Uzumaki was very serious about the proposal. It even made sense, somewhat… but his thoughts immediately rejected the notion of teaming up with the 'dead last'. This test is the perfect opportunity to test out his skills against an older and experienced combatant. If he could not pass it alone, how in the world could he even hope to defeat his brother?

"Get out of my sight, dead last," Sasuke muttered coldly. "I can take him down. Now stop bothering me."

The blonde Uzumaki sighed. He had been expecting this, of course, but one could only hope, right? At least he did ask first. Time for the second phase of his prank.

"Too bad…" Naruto stated evenly, standing up, and slowly walking behind Sasuke, away from his view. The young Uchiha then started thinking a means of escape, struggling somewhat hoping to loosen enough soil to wiggle his arms out when he heard a zipper open. Without warning, Sasuke felt something warm poured over his head.

"Ahhh… this feels good," Naruto's voice was heard from behind, unseen. Sasuke could only shake, his eyes widening at the implication.

"Na…ru…to!!!" Sasuke growled. His voice became cold, dead serious as he spoke the next few words void with any emotion, save for cold fury. "I will kill you. When I get out of here, I will kill you!"

"Nyahahaha!" the blonde laughed, moving in front of the young Uchiha, revealing the source of the warm liquid being poured over his exposed head: a water bottle with a small hole on its cover. "Gotcha!" Naruto declared. "You thought I pissed on you, didn't you? Nyahahahaha! Last Genius of the Uchiha my ass… you couldn't even distinguish the difference with your nose! No smell… obviously, water!"

And to prove his point, Naruto unscrewed the cap, and took a big sip from the bottle. He then smirked, and poured the rest of the contents to the still-trapped Uchiha.

"There you go!" the blonde declared. "You could do with some cooling down. You were about to pop a vein there."

Before Sasuke could say anything more, the whole area rang as the alarm was set off, signaling the end of their survival training.

* * *

"Well… okay," Kakashi declared, scratching the back of his head. In front of him, he felt the killing intent emanating from both Sakura and Sasuke, directed to the blonde kid, who was not paying attention. He never really got the gist of what happened and what Naruto did to garner such reactions. He had found Sakura unconscious on the ground, apparently, in shock, and only muttered about a perverted blonde being her nightmare. Sasuke, he found, with Naruto, glaring at the blonde who was making faces to him, still trapped by the Inner Decapitation Earth Jutsu that Kakashi used on him during their tussle.

No explanation why the young Uchiha's hair was wet though. Asking was even more useless, as the stoic boy just glared at the blonde in silence.

"It seems we all have a bunch of losers here," the jounin declared. "None of you could even grab a bell. You three… ought to quit as ninjas."

Naruto smirked somewhat, whilst Sasuke and Sakura stopped glaring towards the blonde. The young Uchiha could only growl, looking downwards in shame. Sakura was somewhat more indignant though.

"But sensei! You asked us to try and beat you…. But how can we, just graduates try and fight you off?"

"This is why you three are useless!" Kakashi replied back. "Until now do any of you even realize the point of this exam?"

"Teamwork."

Sasuke, Sakura and Kakashi suddenly looked towards Naruto who was looking at them neutrally. Seeing their eyes on him, he shrugged.

"Well… it's kinda obvious," the blonde muttered. "As Sakura points out, we're just graduates. You are a jounin who never revealed much of himself to us. Our skills have been measured… you probably know how good we are. We don't know how good you are. Odds are… we'd lose to you immediately."

"But… the bells…!" the pink-haired kunoichi muttered, only to be cut off.

"Dilemma. The bells create a dilemma," Naruto shrugged again. "Turns us against each other. Make us not see the real meaning of this test." He then stared at Sakura. "And you were supposed to be the smart one."

"He's right," Kakashi muttered, taking Sakura's attention away from the boy before she did anything drastic. He could feel her killing intent leaking out again. "This test was designed to make you work on something we call Teamwork. There is a reason why you have been divided to teams and training like this."

He looked towards the blonde genin, and shook his head. "You knew… yet you faced me alone. Most of you were either running on their own, or just didn't support one another."

"Hey… I asked," Naruto growled, earning the attention of the others. "Ask Pinky and Chicken Butt. I asked them to team-up with me… but they rejected me."

"Well… that's interesting," the man muttered. He looked towards the two. "Let this be my first lesson to all of you. As ninjas, your lives are at risk as you fulfill your duties."

Kakashi moved forward, letting the genins see a small square statue with names clearly written in it. The man looked at it rather longingly, and stated, "In this world, acting individually can disrupt teamwork, and forfeit your life, and your mission." He paused. "This stone… look. These ninjas are considered heroes. A memorial for those who had died in duty.

"My best friend's name is carved here," the man whispered, though audible for the others to hear. There was a slight pause as the air remained silent as Sasuke and Sakura didn't know what to say. Naruto, knowing Kakashi's history from his past, just spent the time in silence.

"Now then," the jounin suddenly looking at the genins. "We'll start over again." He looked at them seriously. "After lunch, we will do this test once more… but I will make it even harder for you guys to pass. And… as an extra…"

With rather lightning speed, Kakashi dashed immediately towards the group alerting the three who went immediately on defensive. Expecting an attack, Sasuke was about to counter-attack when he was in range, only to be surprised when the jounin just grabbed Sakura, and pinned her on the tree stump. As she was in shock, he began to tie her up on the tree rather tightly, and retreated before anyone could ask what he was doing.

"H-Hey!" Sakura muttered, finally as she saw Kakashi walk away from her. "What is this sensei!?"

"Punishment. As the only member of the team who didn't even try grabbing for the bells, nor tried anything at all, you will be the only one who will not be fed."

"WHAT!?" Sakura shouted. "B-b-but I thought individual action…"

"Shut it, Pinky," Kakashi growled suddenly, glaring at the genin and quieting her down. "I am the rules here. Naruto, Sasuke, you are both free to eat lunch. If both of you try to feed Sakura, I'll fail you all. Understand?"

"No problem boss," Naruto suddenly declared.

"Good. Now, I'll go somewhere real quick, and when I comeback, we will do the exercise again," the jounin declared, and disappeared completely from their sight.

"Heh… like I'd follow that," the blonde genin declared. Looking left and right, he grabbed his kunai before going behind the tied Sakura, and slowly cutting the bonds.

Sasuke, who was about to open his lunch, was taken aback when Naruto was seemingly trying to free their pinned down teammate.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Well, if we're all going to work together… all of us should be prepared," Naruto reasoned. "I ate lunch and I'm not even hungry. Sakura didn't and I'm sure she's starving."

"I don't need your pity," Sakura growled, but stopped speaking when her stomach growled even louder.

"Your stomach says it needs food, though," the blonde declared.

"And if you're caught, we all fail!" Sakura stated.

"Well… I don't sense him around," Naruto muttered, finally freeing Sakura. He looked at Sasuke. "Do you?"

The young Uchiha shook his head. "Don't sense him either."

"See?" Naruto smiled at Sakura. "If you don't believe me, let boy-wonder here convince you otherwise."

"Stop insulting-"

"Lunch?" the blonde cut Sakura off, giving his unopened lunchbox to her. .

The pink-haired genin grabbed the lunchbox almost greedily, forgetting the small jab Naruto had done to Sasuke and was about to open and dive in when suddenly, the area was covered with smoke, and in the middle was the rather scary silhouette looking at them.

It was Kakashi… and he looked angry. So angry that Sakura almost dropped the lunchbox she was offered and Sasuke was in again a defensive position.

"YOU GUYS… Pass."

Sasuke's jaw slackened somewhat, his eyes narrowing as he looked at the jounin while Sakura was still trembling, breaking a cold sweat as she stupidly asked:

"Huh…?"

"Heh…" Kakashi's demeanor changed. He looked liked he was smiling at them. "You're the first."

"Huh…?" Sakura had to ask again. Naruto wondered if her brain died that moment.

"Everyone… every single one would just do whatever I told them," the jounin explained, sitting down on the ground. "They were morons. A ninja must see underneath the underneath. They say ninjas that break the rules are trash… well, you know what? Those that don't take care of their comrades are even lower than trash."

Kakashi stood up. "And that ends our training for today. As of now, you are officially, Team 7."

"YES!" Naruto shouted. "YES! WOOHOO! Gonna tell my brothers! ALRIGHT!"

"Uh… Naruto," Kakashi called, but before he could say anything, the blonde genin upped and left leaving the rest of the team and their newly appointed jounin sensei alone. "And he's gone… someone go to his house and tell him to meet back here tomorrow at ten."

And with that, Kakashi disappears leaving the two hungry genins alone.

Sakura looked towards Sasuke who was now preparing his chopsticks. Preparing hers as well, she wondered for a moment if she knew where the blonde lived. She didn't.

"Hey, Sasuke-kun," Sakura called.

"Hnn?" Sasuke replied back, not looking at her.

"Do you know where the Uzumaki brothers live?"

"No… but it's easy to find out… knowing how loud they are," the young Uchiha explained.

"Yeah… but… still," Sakura looked down. The image of Naruto giving her his lunchbox somewhat touched her. Even with that rather bizarre encounter with her future self (or was it? She never could convince herself about that) she realized that maybe she was somewhat too hard on him. Maybe she ought to treat him better…

All those forgiving thoughts vanished when both Sasuke and Sakura opened their lunchboxes, and both exploded right into their faces, covering their faces with black smoke with the smell of burning paper lingering in the air. The genins coughed loudly, somewhat confused at what happened, and only when the smoke cleared did they find out what happened.

On their lunchboxes was a note, written and signed by Naruto:

_**Nyah-nyah. Go eat lunch somewhere else morons! **_

Sasuke's hands snapped the lunchbox in two, while Sakura could only do what she could. She screamed Naruto's name.

* * *

Kakashi looked back where the training area was, swearing he heard Sakura scream. He paid no heed. He had to report back to the Third Hokage about his team passing. Coming towards the Hokage's office at the deepest part of the village, he flagged the secretary, and presenting himself to her.

"Need to see Hokage-sama," Kakashi asked.

"Take a seat," the secretary replied. "Hokage-sama currently has guests."

Nodding, the Copycat Ninja went to lounge comfortably into one of the couches, and put his hand on his vest pocket, feeling the small protrusion of his favorite handbook. Giggling somewhat, he opened the pocket, and grabbed the book, taking it out to try and… read?

"What the hell…?" Kakashi whispered to himself, realizing that he brought out was a block of wood, written in bold letters, signed by Naruto.

_**What's more important? The bells… or your book? **_

_**PS. Don't be late tomorrow. **_

"Son of a…" the jounin bit his lip. The Third should hear about this, Kakashi thought. There was something off about this kid.

* * *

Back to the Uzumaki apartments, Laharl chowed down on his food while Buds looked towards Naruto, who was stealing glances from the orange book he had stolen from the jounin earlier that day. The blonde chuckled at times, taking spoonfuls of food to his mouth from time to time.

"What?" Naruto asked, looking back towards his brother who was staring at him.

"Is this wise?" Buds asked, his lips twitching slightly. "You cannot afford to show your true skills at this point."

"Well… it wasn't really all my skill… I almost got caught stealing it and thankfully, Kakashi-sensei thought I was actually going for the bells, and didn't even bother to check when he substituted my clone to his place during the… uh, how do you say it? Acquisition?"

"Even so," the brown-haired Uzumaki reasoned. "You know he'll be going after you now. No genin is supposed to be that prepared. Now he'll think you knew before-hand about his habits and he'll start to question how you know them. You're going to make this harder on yourself and us especially when we're planning to-"

"I know, Buds…" Naruto declared, butting his brother off. "Don't worry. I'll make it work."

"You better," Buds sighed. "I still heard Sakura's scream from out training grounds. Pranking your teammates is good and all, but don't turn the whole team against you."

"Why not? They should get used to it," the blonde smirked. "Coz I'm gonna pound them to make them ready." He paused. "Plus… come on, its fun!"

Buds sighed. "Look… we're gonna have our hands full. If we're going to make this plan work, we have to need everyone with the skills with us."

"Don't worry… I'll make those two better," Naruto muttered, finally getting serious. "Kakashi… I'll give him a spin, keep him close enough to know that I am definitely on his side." The blonde paused, looking at Buds, who nodded, somewhat convinced of his sincerity. The blonde smirked once more. "How was your day?"

"Officially, we don't start taking missions until all new rookie teams have officially been submitted and named," Buds shrugged. "I guess we're the early ones."

"Yeah," Laharl spoke finally, stopping shoving the food to his mouth. "Plus it gave a good chance for Luckless Wonder here to make his moves on that Otaku Princess."

"Laharl… shut up," Buds glared at the purple-haired Uzumaki.

Naruto grinned. "Rea-he-he-healy? Do tell more."

"Yeah, they were getting cozy on a tree, exchanging love letters."

"Oh come on! It was the JUMP Weekly she had promised to lend me yesterday!" Buds explained.

"Yet you were sitting sooo close," Laharl declared.

"She was afraid I'd ruin it like what you did to her manga!"

"Buds and Ami sitting on the tree… K-I-S-S-I-N…" Naruto began singing, only to be cut off by Buds' fist coming at him. The blonde could only laugh harder as he dodged. "Oh come on, don't be defensive. We all know you really love Hinata."

"Of course… coz we all know you're one damn big lolicon," Laharl declared, only for Buds to shove the bowl of rice to the purple-haired Uzumaki's mouth forcefully.

"There, eat some more rice," Buds growled. Laharl removed the bowl, and the two began fighting among themselves, making Naruto laugh even louder until someone's fist hit him on the face.

"Oh, that is frigging it," the blonde declared and was about to jump into the fray when the front door of their apartment smashed, revealing both Sasuke and Sakura, who were still covered in black ashes, looking straight towards the blonde.

"Uzumaki…" Sasuke growled, his hands coming together.

"Na… RU… TO!" Sakura shouted, cracking her knuckles.

"Hey, Chicken Butt! Pinky! What brings you here?" Naruto greeted them with a smile. "You guys haven't even cleaned yourselves yet?"

"**DIE**!"

"Here we go!" Naruto laughed as he launched himself towards an open window, followed by Sakura and Sasuke, who was now forming his seals, and exhaling out a few fireballs.

Needless to say… the Third Hokage and the whole village was kept up rather late until everything was resolved. Team 7'debuted with the village as the most destructive team they had ever seen but for Naruto… they hadn't seen nothing yet.

**To Be Continued…**

* * *

**OMAKE!**

"Poor Pinky. She knew how the basic henge worked... too bad she never realized we don't really follow the way the academy had taught it," the clone stated, and held that humongous chest in two hands. "The Uzumaki Perfect Henge no Jutsu!"

The other Naruto looked towards him, and shook his head, frowning.

"You kinda overdid it," he muttered. And he looked towards her again. "And stop touching those."

"Oh come on," the transformed clone declared, wiggling her/his extra chest pieces in circular motions. "These melons must be bigger than Baa-chan's!"

The other Naruto clone looked at her/him. His hand came to his chin. "A tad bigger, yes. Really, though… do they have to be?"

"You haven't seen Buds' little doujin collection, have you?"

"I don't want to know."

* * *

**Author's Notes: **

_Well, this chapter was done way before I started The Dark Lady, but because this is one of the few stories that I have my lovely editor edit, it had been delayed for some time. I may seriously invest on this story though… more than ten chapters, hopefully… Hope you enjoyed this one, and look forward to the next one._


	7. Chapter 7

**Team 7 vs. Team 9: Ultimate Fight! Uchiha Sasuke vs. Uzumaki Tenshin!**

**

* * *

**

Uchiha Sasuke… genius.

Uchiha Sasuke… the last of the great Uchiha clan surviving in the Hidden Leaf Village.

Uchiha Sasuke… kicking Uzumaki Naruto's butt in a straight taijitsu fight.

Uchiha Sasuke… very annoyed.

"Dobe!" he screamed, finally getting pissed. "Stop fooling around and fight me seriously!"

It was Team 7's break time from missions, which meant more training. For Kakashi, training meant team bonding. For Sasuke, team bonding meant spars with the person who seemed good enough to train with… and that certain person was the blonde Uzumaki.

Naruto laughed as he scratched the back part of his head. He was currently on the ground, looking worse for wear. Sasuke easily swept tripped him with ease. He was using a more advanced version of taijitsu the Academy had taught, mostly from the Uchiha scrolls. Naruto, on the other hand, was using only basic taijutsu.

The raven-haired genin growled. He knew Naruto had been holding back. He had seen the blonde in action during their survival training test. The style he had used there was different and almost completely unreadable, using circular motions to gain advantages on his attacks, keeping the flow of his attacks using continuous flow and momentum. Compared to that, the Academy style Naruto had been using every time they sparred after that was complete crap.

Sasuke could not guess why Naruto would go to such a rather inferior style of fighting. It was so basic that almost all genins knew they had to drop it when it came to real battles or serious sparring. There was little to no satisfaction in beating the him using such style. Sasuke grabbed Naruto by the collar of his orange jacket. He then hissed towards the blonde, demanding him to take it much more seriously.

"Now, now, Sasuke," Kakashi stated calmly, raising both his hands, "you won the fight. There is no need to get angst-y."

"I want a real fight!" Sasuke growled. "Why are you holding back, dobe? Why!?"

Sakura, who had been watching the whole exchange, could only admire Sasuke's fiery eyes. They were, apparently, so manly.

"Sasuke has a point, Naruto," Kakashi stated. "There is no point in sparring with each other unless you take each other seriously. Otherwise… it's just insulting."

_Ooh, caught on, have you? _Naruto thought, wanting to say it, but held his tongue. True, he was limiting himself using that awful taijutsu style that the Academy gave him. He had remembered being stuck with it all his life before Buds slowly taught him the finesse of sword and weapon mastery that also included a small crash course in unarmed combat, which he used during his fight with Kakashi during their bell test. While he could hold his ground better with that style, the real reason why Naruto would not up the ante was that he was setting up a small fight between Buds and Sasuke. He was on the process of sowing the seeds for it.

"Ne… Sasuke," Naruto scratched the back of his head. "If you want to fight that bad… why don't you challenge my brother? He's the one who taught me."

"Laharl? He's even worse than you!" Sasuke replied, remembering the purple-headed Uzumaki who had shown almost no skills in unarmed combat… even though he had somewhat monstrous strength and endurance.

"No, no! Buds! He's very good at unarmed combat, I swear!" Naruto smiled. Well, he was a better ninja than Buds, but he wasn't going to say that now. "So… challenge him!"

"Why not you? Why aren't you taking this seriously?" Sasuke growled.

Naruto made a mocked disappointed face. He had placed the bait… now he slowly tried to lure the Uchiha in. "Ne, ne, Sasuke… are you scared?"

"What!?" the young Uchiha growled. Did he just hear the blonde moron right?

"Are you scared you're gonna get your tail kicked by Buds?" Naruto asked again, ignoring the killer intent waving out of Sasuke. "I mean, I can understand. You always did avoid him during taijutsu class in the academy-"

"I have not! You three avoided me!" Sasuke replied, cutting the blonde short.

Naruto chuckled mentally. That was true, the Uzumaki boys did avoid Sasuke for a good amount of time during the Academy days. Still… a little tug for the fish before reeling him in.

"And I guess it's pretty natural for the weak to avoid the strong-"

"HEY! Don't call SASUKE-KUN WEAK! He's prolly stronger than the three of you stupid Uzumakis!" Sakura shouted, seething. How dare Naruto mock him!? As the number one (in her mind) Sasuke admirer and girlfriend (again, entirely made up from her mind), she would not allow some blonde monkey to insult him like that.

Apparently, not even Sasuke would. His eyes narrowed further.

"I'll challenge him then! You tell your brother to watch his back!" Sasuke hissed, before releasing Naruto. He stalked away from the blonde boy, who silently celebrated his success of luring and reeling in the biting fish.

Kakashi could only shake his head. In his opinion, Naruto caught Sasuke too easily then.

**

* * *

**

A few days later, in the Hokage's office, Team 7 reported in after another D-Rank mission done, and were waiting for the next one. This was a normal occurrence for the team, though this time, it was obvious that Sasuke still on the edge and a bit anxious, while Sakura stayed by his side, ignored. Naruto was just smiling.

"Ah… Kakashi, welcome back," the Hokage stated, looking somewhat tired.

The doors opened, and Sasuke immediately tensed when he noticed Asuka Goh and Team 9 entering. Behind the jounin-sensei was Morino Ami, Uzumaki Laharl, and Sasuke's current obsession, Uzumaki Tenshin (Buds, as everyone calls him).

"Goh, what a… coincidence," Kakashi greeted with some force to it.

"Quite… good timing too," Hokage greeted, with force as well. "I have currently a D-Rank mission, which requires two teams."

Goh's eyes never changed. "Oh? Then what a… coincidence," he stated, as if he was reading a script, word-for-word. "Kakashi-sempai… since we're both here, why don't both our teams take it?"

"That is a very good idea!" Kakashi stated, eagerly. Oddly, he was saying it unemotionally.

Laharl, Buds, Ami, Sasuke and Sakura looked at the three adults with an odd expression. Naruto slapped his forehead with his right hand.

"Very well… here you go. The mission is from Farmer Ohno. Apparently, his usual hired hands had been injured in an accident, and he needs some help for the day," the Hokage said, giving the scroll to Kakashi. "Collaborate with Team 9, Kakashi. And Godspeed."

"Alright. Team 7, move out," Kakashi stated, pointing towards the door. "Meet at the East Gate. I'll follow later. Except you, Naruto. You stay."

Sasuke 'hn'ed and moved out, with Sakura on the tow. Naruto stayed behind.

"Team 9, follow Team 7. I'll meet you up as well," Goh commanded.

Ami, Laharl, and Buds nodded, and walked out of the room. Naruto breathed a small sigh of relief when the doors closed.

"What crappy acting, you three" Naruto muttered. The Hokage chuckled, good-naturedly at that.

"I'm sure they didn't suspect a thing," Kakashi stated, scratching the back part of his head. "Well… deal's a deal."

"Yeah… gotcha," Naruto took out the orange book he had stolen from Kakashi. He threw it towards the silver-haired man, who caught it easily.

For a moment, Kakashi contemplated on whispering sweet-nothings to his precious book which he missed for quite a while, and was about to before Naruto stated something that made the Hokage chuckle out loud.

"Don't go humping it now," Naruto muttered before leaving the office. Kakashi's cheeks went aflame as Hokage laughed once more.

"So… Kakashi-sempai… that was the reason why you arrange this collaboration?" Goh asked, his voice conveying some annoyance, yet also a tone of understanding.

Kakashi nodded.

A few days ago, Kakashi asked the Hokage and Goh to do a collaboration assignment with Team 7 and Team 9. He explained that he wanted to see Sasuke and Buds together to duke it out, and while Goh had no problems with friendly sparring and competition, he was very suspicious of Kakashi until the silver-haired jounin admitted that Naruto was blackmailing him.

Using the Icha Icha as a hostage… how deplorable, Kakashi stated.

"Fine. Sounds fun," Goh nodded, along with the Hokage.

"Yeah well… the ball is now is on Naruto's court. We'll see how it goes from there," Kakashi stated.

**

* * *

**

Farmer Ohno greeted the two teams with relief. Even if the demon brats were among them, he was in desperate need of hired hands. With the delivery due tomorrow, he needed people to harvest his vegetables and fruits, milk the cows, shear his sheep, feed the pigs, grab eggs from the chickens, and clean up the pig-sty.

"Team 7 reporting for the mission," Kakashi called.

"Along with Team 9," Goh finished.

"Okay… let's get over this," Ohno stated, going down to business.

**

* * *

**

"No, no, no!" Ohno shouted, slapping Sakura's hands with his stick. "You do not just pull out the carrot leaf! Dig a bit, and then pull it!"

Sakura growled, but did as asked.

"And you! Same with the potatoes!" Ohno ordered towards Ami, who was a bit brutal with her harvest as well, though instead, hit the older girl on the buttocks, with a slight lecherous grin.

"YEEP!" Ami flinched back, straightening up. Her expression darkened, and her left hand went towards her right hand, sparking with electrical energy. "You damned pervert!"

Laharl and Buds had to tackle Ami down before she could kill their client.

**

* * *

**

"And that's how you milk the cow," Ohno demonstrated, gently pulling the cows teats, letting the white fluid squirt out with ease.

"Huh… why do that hard work?" Ami raised her left hand, sparking once again with energy. "I read that you can just electrocute with enough voltage and time, squirting out liquid would be done easily in no time."

Sakura's eyes widened, along with Naruto. Sasuke tried not to look interested, but what she just said was pretty out there to not pay attention.

"Pray tell, where did you learn that?" Buds asked, afraid what the answer was.

"Art of Genetalia Torture."

That stunned everyone, even Ohno, who moved practically towards his fine bred cows for protection.

"Let's try," Ami declared with a rather psychotic smile, moving towards the farmer and his cow. "It's a good way to get back at that butt slap."

"Would you knock it off!?" Laharl and Buds exclaimed, tackling Ami once more.

"What a weird team…" Sakura muttered.

"Hn," Sasuke replied. His eyes were on Buds.

"Yeah… no kidding," Naruto pondered. "I mean… those are the mammary glands, not the genital area. Where did she get that idea?"

Sakura could only sweat drop at that. "That's what you're going to say?" she asked.

Naruto looked at his pink-haired companion, contemplated a bit, and shook his head. "Well… I could have said how a cow easily beat you, but that would be too much."

Sasuke was treated with the sight of Naruto socked hard by a very angry kunoichi.

**

* * *

**

"And that's how you shear wool off the sheep," Ohno stated, unfolding the wool he had cut straight from the shears. "When it's done, just unfold it, and place it on the box right here."

While Ohno unfolded the wool towards its place, the genin all looked nervous. Milking the cow was one thing, but shearing wool seemed about five steps more complicated than anything they have done. Naruto, of all the Universes he explored, all the experience he had accumulated, he had no idea how to do this. Same for Buds, who was more refined than the other two Uzumakis.

"Well?" Ohno asked, looking back at them. "What are you waiting for?"

Handing them shears, the genins looked at each other nervously. Ohno chuckled silently, seeing their reaction. They did their jobs well, he supposed, but it seems they finally hit a brick wall.

"Um… Ohno-san," Sakura started, "I don't think we can do this…"

"It's easy-peasy," Ohno replied. "You don't have to do it perfectly. Just try to at least keep the coat whole."

"Can't we use our kunai?" Naruto asked, not knowing what to do with the instruments he had been holding.

"No," was Ohno's easy reply.

"Can we just kill the sheep?" Laharl asked. "That way, it's easier to cut. Plus you'd get some lambchops for dinner."

The farmer's eyes twitched. "No."

"You know, I read once that using slight electrical charges to change ionization, hairs would stand up from end to end… making it easier to cut-"

"NO!" Ohno sighed. He immediately went towards another part of the barn, and took out six identical tools, which the genins didn't recognize. Grabbing the shears they had been holding, Ohno gave them the new tools he had fetched.

"What are these?" Buds asked, curious.

"Electric shears… good stuff for beginners," Ohno explained. "With chock full of safety features, even as inexperienced as you lot can shear sheep easily and safely! Of course… they tend to thin out the coat more than traditional shears…"

"Sheesh, I wanted to do the ionization thing," Ami muttered, sounding defeated.

"Should have come out with this earlier," Sakura nodded.

"Give me back the manual shear. It's easier for me to kill the sheep with it," Laharl stated with an odd sense of normality in his voice.

"You know… I could try and learn the manual way," Buds pondered.

"You know, I know a barber shop in Konoha that used tools like those manual shears!" Naruto exclaimed with a smile. "I can prolly give sheep my hairstyle!"

"Hn…" Sasuke muttered, looking bored at the tool that he was given.

Ohno groaned. The kids were kinda getting on his nerves. They were too weird.

* * *

"Damnit… it stinks!" all the genin muttered as they entered the pigsty. All of them immediately covered their noses, and Sasuke, as stone faced as he was during the whole mission, was showing signs of utter disgust. It was pretty much the first time any of them saw the Uchiha have a crinkled nose.

Ohno laughed. The smell didn't bother him much… and not because he was used to it. On his face was a mask, which blocked out most of the smell out. Plus, watching a bunch of ninja kids apparently gagging on this early, he wanted to see what would happen later when they would have to return for the last task.

"Alright, no complaints!" the farmer shouted, muffled somewhat behind his mask. "Feeding is pretty simple…"

**

* * *

**

After feeding the pigs, the next step was getting all the eggs that the chickens have laid. After all the complicated messthat the genin had to pass through, this job was sort of easier than the rest. What could be easier than grabbing a few eggs from a bunch of flightless birds?

It was, apparently, not that easier since the chickens were probably half demons. They pecked, pecked, and pecked anyone to death. The genins were so unsure how to react when a whole mob of feathered masses conglomerated together in form not dissimilar to mass protest and charged after them like soldiers. It wasn't long before chaos reigned.

"This… is… insanity!" Sakura shouted as one of the chickens dove towards her forehead, and pecked it.

"No… this… IS… CHICKEN HELL!" Naruto shouted, trying to by-pass a few feathered and mad animals.

"Eye on the prize! Eye on the prize!" Buds shouted as he sidestepped the flurry of Kentucky's proud victims.

"Stupid… feathered… prinny-like… imbeciles!" and the chickens immediately swarmed Laharl.

Electrical charged swarmed Ami, which the chickens immediately avoided as her eyes narrowed, and her tone darkened, addressing them, "Do you know what happens to chickens when they are struck by lightning?" Her smile turned evil. "I eat them for breakfast."

Sasuke was just quiet. The chickens had surrounded him, looking at him oddly. It was not before long that they just sat there near him, relaxing. One chicken found itself atop of Sasuke's head.

"Well, I knew it when I started to call him Chicken Butt that it meant something," Naruto's voice called, earning a twitch from his Uchiha teammate. "Keep attracting all the chicks, Sasuke! Your sacrifice will ensure our mission's success!"

"Hn…" Sasuke stated. He looked around, and sure enough, the mass of chickens were slowly coming towards him, and relaxing. Well, he was thankful. At least they were chickens. Girls on the other hand…

**

* * *

**

There was only one job left, and it was the worst thing that the genins have ever faced today. Enduring the perverted butt-slaps of Ohno, milking a cow, then shearing sheep, face the unstoppable odor of the pig sty, and finally facing off the murderous chickens, the last part was probably worse than all the five tasks combined.

Now they had to clean the pigsty after the pigs finished eating. If it stunk before, now… it was just lethal.

"No. Way." Sasuke huffed, looking at all the genins with his patented death glare, something he had not used for a while.

"It's the last task," Buds stated, but before he could even talk about dealing with it, Ami growled and shut him up.

"There is no way I'm going in there anymore," the older genin muttered. "And if anyone tries to force me in… I'll fry them."

Sakura could only hold her mouth, trying to keep her lunch from going out the wrong way. Laharl looked somewhat disgusted at the place. The only genin who looked remarkably calm was Naruto. Heck, he was smirking.

"Ne, ne…" he started, earning the attention of all genin. "Let's start a competition!"

The first reaction was typical. Laharl looked uninterested. Ami and Sakura looked at the blonde with curiosity, while Buds had a thoughtful look. The only genin who seemed to take up on what Naruto had just said was Sasuke, whose eyes dove immediately towards Naruto, and then towards his brother.

"Naruto…" Sakura sighed. Seriously, the blonde had ridiculous ideas. "Did it ever occur to you that we are in a mission right now?

"Yeah, seriously. This is silly. What are you trying to-" Ami was cut off when her teammates responded to the blonde's statement.

"What are you proposing?" Buds asked.

"Hey," Ami looked towards him. "You're not seriously gonna listen to this?"

"Competition between two teams!" Naruto declared. "Losers will have to clean up the pig sty!"

"WHAT!?" Sakura shouted.

"Now we're talking!" Ami declared. If the kid could was proposing a way for her not to do the job, she was all in.

Sasuke looked up. His hands started to shake with some anticipation. "What kind of competition?"

"Anything goes taijitsu spar between the representatives of the two teams," Naruto declared. "No ninjutsu, no bloodline, no genjutsu. Weapons permitted, but try not to kill each other. Wins by KO, or submission! Whatcha say?"

"Sounds good," Buds declared, his eyes not moving away from the blonde.

"Hey, hey!" Sakura exclaimed, trying to get the conversation back from insanity. "Come on! We can't do this! What will our senseis say?"

"I say it's a good idea," Kakashi's voice came out behind them, shocking the pink haired kunoichi. She fell on her backside, stunned.

Goh was beside Kakashi, though he was giving an encouraging nod. "I'll be the referee," he stated.

"I guess its time to vote for your representatives then," Kakashi recalled. "So, who against who?"

"Of course… I vote for Sasuke-kun!" Sakura exclaimed.

"Seconded," Naruto nodded, smiling and without missing a beat.

Kakashi rolled his eyes at that. So this was it, eh? Naruto did not even try covering his involvement. Anyone who knew him then knew this was all part of his plan.

"Team 9?" Goh called.

Laharl shrugged, not interested, but Ami looked prepared to move forward. There was no way she'd skip such opportunity. Cleaning the pigsty was not on her list. She would quickly finish the pompous Uchiha off, get off cleanly and enforcing the disgusting job towards the opposing team… or so she thought. Beating her to the punch was Buds, who, to her surprise, actually took up on the challenge.

"What the hell are you doing?" Ami whispered. This was unlike her companion, remembering his actions when they first met. He'd sooner run from a fight, unless he was pretty much cornered.

"I want to fight him," Buds whispered back. "Besides… Naruto told me Sasuke wants to try me out."

Ami snorted. Boys. "If you lose, I will skin you alive. No joke," she growled, before backing off.

"Ah… so, Uzumaki Tenshin, and Uchiha Sasuke," Kakashi stated, ignoring Buds trying to correct him (he hates being called Tenshin). "This will be interesting. So… any of the parties disagree? Loser's team will clean up the pigsty. Agreed?"

"Agreed," both genins stated, without taking eyes off each other, assessing, psyching themselves.

"Wait! Wait!" Naruto suddenly called. "I forgot the best part!"

All eyes turned towards the blonde who suddenly held up a maid dress. Everyone wondered for a moment what it was for before Naruto dropped the bombshell…

"Loser will have to wear this when he's gonna clean the pig sty!"

**

* * *

**

Back at the Hidden Leaf village, the Hokage suddenly looked up when he thought he heard a rather loud battle cry. Or maybe it was a shout of disbelief? Never minding that, the old man went and started stamping more papers, wondering when he can finally go outside again.

**

* * *

**

"I'll kill you, dobe," Sasuke muttered, looking murderously at the blonde.

Before the fight, Kakashi had ordered the two to go to their respective teams and Sasuke was looking at the blonde Uzumaki who just turned this simple sparring contest into something more fiercely competitive. No male genin, or female one for the matter would be caught dead wearing such a ridiculous dress!

"Eh, if you don't wanna wear it, then win," Naruto explain, shrugging his shoulders like this was an everyday thing. "Besides… look at Sakura. She isn't complaining."

Well, she probably was not conscious as well. The only thing she had been doing ever since Naruto had added a stipulation was gape in her place, with her mouth opening and closing like a goldfish.

"Whatever…" Sasuke muttered. He looked at Naruto for a moment, and was about to say something to him, when he just opted to turn around, and face off against his teammates brother.

"Sasuke… get him early. The longer the fight takes place, the higher the chance that he'll win this one," Naruto whispered, just audible enough for the Uchiha. Sasuke never replied, but the blonde knew that he heard him.

"Shinobis, at the centre," Goh called. Buds and Sasuke looked at each other with neutral expressions, while their respective teams watched at the sidelines. The jounin-sensei of Team 9 nodded, and then restated the rules.

"One on one battle. Anything goes except bloodline limits, ninjutsu, and genjutsu. Winner by KO or submission. Being down for ten seconds is considered a KO. Any questions?"

The two boys shook their heads.

"Then… Fight!"

Sasuke dove for his shuriken pockets, and immediately threw them towards their intended target. Metal whizzed through the air, and met metal as Buds drew out his kunai to defend himself from the incoming attacks. Like a spring, fully loaded, the raven-haired Uchiha dashed forward immediately, his own kunai out, and he began his attack.

The teams watched with reserved awe as the two kunais met each other with enough force to cause a few sparks to appear here and there. Ami looked somewhat pleased, half-expecting Buds to chicken out. She knew he was skilled in combat, having fought him to know that, but it was probably the first time she could see how good he actually is. Keeping up with the Uchiha prodigy, he may actually make it through, and save her the trouble of skinning him.

Oops, she seemed to have thought too soon. Sasuke got the first clean hit in, one punch towards his opponent's face with enough force to make Buds reel in pain. The Uchiha had thrown his kunai as a means of distraction, and when the brown-haired Uzumaki blocked the projectile, only to receive the first clean hit of the fight when the projectile turned out to be a feint.

"It's starting," Naruto whispered quietly, seriously.

"Ha! I knew Sasuke-kun could beat your brother so easily!" Sakura stated, finally out of her goldfish act, cheering loudly towards her crush.

"What are you talking about?" Naruto asked quietly. "Sasuke's on the path of losing."

"HAH! You're just being a sore loser!" Sakura stated, forgetting that Naruto had a stake with this competition as well.

"What do you mean by it Naruto?" Kakashi asked, curious, ignoring the pink haired kunoichi.

"Check out Buds' legs, Kakashi-sensei," the blonde boy pointed out.

The jounin looked carefully, and realized what Naruto was pointing out. Those who did not know what to look for would completely miss it, but to Kakashi, it was clear as day. As Sasuke went for another hit towards his enemy, Buds' legs and knee would bend slightly on impact.

"He's… he's negating the damage," Kakashi concluded with a hint of awe.

"Not completely, but yeah…" Naruto pointed towards Team 9. "Laharl knows… I don't know about Ami-san, but Laharl recognizes the motion. Like a spring, the legs and knees take the energy all through his body and towards the ground. He's probably feeling only twenty percent of the total damage that Sasuke's dishing on him."

"Even so…" Kakashi continued to look, as Buds tried to counter Sasuke's attacks, only to narrowly miss and take a hit in return. "He can't win the battle through attrition. Didn't you say your brother was more skilled than you are? I just don't… oh… whoa."

"You caught on?" Naruto smirked.

Kakashi just nodded.

Sasuke again dodged the pathetic attempt to hit him, and stretched out his hands with a backhanded punch to whip Buds again with a clean hit. He had been wondering for a moment if the blonde Uzumaki just set him up… there was no way he could claim that Buds was stronger than he was. It was utterly ridiculous! He whipped his hand again, moving his whole body with the attack, twisting his legs as he came in for the coup de grace, only to take a hard hit on the face.

Sakura and Ami gasped in surprise. The Uchiha received a hit. A hard one at that. They didn't even see the punch. Laharl could only smirk somewhat when he realized what happened.

"Counter punch. Seems like he's going for boxing," the purple-haired Uzumaki declared.

"Boxing?" Ami asked.

Buds' arms were now on his sides, his legs were springing up and down as he dashed forward, not waiting for Sasuke to recover. Two devastating punches hit the raven-haired genin hard on the body, and a very hard right hand tagged him on his face, forcing him down.

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura shouted, not knowing what just happened.

"It's over," Naruto stated.

Goh did not need to count to ten because Sasuke was up automatically. His face washed with animated expressions, ranging from shock, anger, and disbelief. He glared at his enemy for a moment, checking out the change of fighting style.

Buds was now looking at Sasuke with an unreadable expression, his hands raised towards his neck, his body moving from side to side, flickering somewhat, while his front leg was planted firmly on the ground. His hind leg was on its toes, bouncing on its heel.

Cocking his hand again, Sasuke ran towards the brown-haired Uzumaki only to meet with a straight jab at his face, stopping his tracks. Then, again, another body shot hit him. The Uchiha retreated, knowing full well he couldn't take another one of those punches unless he wanted his ribs to break, but before he could even widen the gap, Buds shifted his feet, moved forward, hitting the raven-haired boy's body with his shoulder. Stunned, Sasuke looked hard as he saw the Buds finally finish off his attack with a swift upward strike towards his chin.

The blow didn't land completely, but it was a clean hit. Only Kakashi and Goh noticed it. To the other genins watching, and even Sasuke thought, the punch was a near miss as the Uchiha jumped away. It wasn't until his legs gave out when he landed did everyone realize the effect of Buds' last attack.

For Sasuke, the whole world suddenly turned topsy-turvy, like the picture in the TV swirling when the there was something wrong with it. He could not regain his balance… he could not even feel his arms. There was something scary about the experience, although quite different from the one he felt when he faced his brother those many years ago, but still, enough to make him slightly shiver uncontrollably.

"You lost," Buds stated

Sasuke looked up; his train of thoughts derailing when he realized his opponent was standing in front of him. In his view, Buds looked odd, swollen in some places, and shrunken in another. He tried to shake his head, fix his vision.

"Don't force it. It was a good fight," the genin in front of the Uchiha declared. "Challenge me again next time."

Sasuke was about to say something towards his opponent, but he could not find the words. He watched as the wobbly figure of Uzumaki Tenshin fade from his view, and a few moments later, he saw Kakashi's deformed face.

"Scary kid," Kakashi whispered. "He allowed you to hit him just to measure your attack strength, your offensive range, and even your fighting style. When the time came, he used all the information he gathered to quickly end the fight."

"What do you mean, sensei?" Sakura's voice came. She must be behind Sasuke because she did not see her.

"He used a pretty unorthodox fighting style for ninjas… boxing. A style concentrates on fists, and leg movement. While it may seem limiting, the style essentially calls for speedy and devastating punches, forgoing the principle of standard taijitsu that students learn in the academy," Kakashi explained.

"Which is?" Naruto asked, wanting to hear his sensei's explanation. While he knew the style, the technical bits he never tried to study upon as he felt it was boring to learn. The fact that it works was more than enough for the blonde.

"I… I want to know too," Sasuke muttered, the whole world finally going back to normal.

"Can you stand?" the jounin asked.

Sasuke nodded, and with some help, stood up.

"Now… punch me," Kakashi ordered.

Sasuke did not even acknowledge the command, just cocked his arm back before he felt a very light tap on his cheek. His eyes widened in surprise as he realized Kakashi beat him to the punch, literally.

"That's how he beat you. With enough training, you won't need to have wasted motions like cocking your arm to create enough momentum to do a forceful attack. You let your legs, knees, hips and shoulders, elbows and even wrist to do it for you," Kakashi explained. "Boxing specializes in that."

Sasuke's eyes widened. It was true. He recalled back to the fight, and realized how incredibly compact his opponent's body was during the fight. He was also sure that at pure speed, he had the edge, but the fact that he had to cock back or dash on his attacks made it useless when Buds' punches just came forward without any wasted movements. No matter how fast he was, his opponent's attack was faster because it came from shorter distances. He could also remember, somewhat, how his opponent's body shifted with each attack… he could learn from that!

"… I…" Sasuke looked at Buds, who rejoined Team 9. His opponent was given a very hard tap from the kunoichi of their team, while the last Uzumaki brother, Laharl, rolled his eyes. "He said I could challenge him again," he whispered.

"Well, that's good," Naruto nodded. "It means Buds likes you. In a non-yaoi manner."

"Hn," Sasuke muttered, looking down. He didn't want to say it, but he was looking forward to that. Unknowingly, he had learned something valuable to add to his taijitsu style… and next time, he'll be much more ready for Uzumaki Tenshin.

"And since you lost, Sasuke-**chan**…"

The raven-haired genin's eyes widened when Naruto called him with the 'chan' suffix. He then remembered what exactly he brought upon himself.

**

* * *

**

Ami could only snicker so loud. Her hands surrounded her sides, as each laugh made her ribs hurt so much, but even in pain, she could not stop laughing. Laharl looked with a raised eyebrow, but after a while, he could only nod, giving an approving thumbs-up (to everyone's surprise). Buds looked embarrassed though glad; he was not the one wearing the dress right now. Farmer Ohno, who just joined in, could not help himself but roll on the ground, laughing like there was no tomorrow.

Sasuke's cheeks went red with embarrassment. The dress fit him… too well, in fact. Even without make-up, Kakashi commented his worst fears.

"Wow… you make a pretty cute girl, Sasuke-chan."

Naruto slapped his knee hard, howling with pure, undiluted laughter of joy. This was probably the best day of his life. It was so worth cleaning the pigsty. This was it. The best. Nirvana. Heaven! The great Uchiha Sasuke in a French maid dress, complete with ruffles, and boots.

"S-s-s… service with a…" Naruto snorted, "… smile!"

Sasuke glared at the blonde boy.

"Oh, don't be such a tsundere!" Ami howled out once more with laughter.

Sasuke had enough. He was about to shout at everyone laughing at him when he saw Sakura's punch-drunk face. Her serene look towards him was scarier than those obsessive looks she had given him during their tenure in the academy. And was it his imagination that the girl was now bleeding from her nostril!?

Goh looked towards the pink-haired kunoichi, and slowly tapped her forehead. She just sprawled on the floor, unconscious.

"Uzumakis…" Sasuke growled, looking towards the blonde that put such a ridiculous stipulation on what supposed to be was a simple sparring, and towards Buds, who looked away. The Uchiha's eyes turned rather murderous. "I'm going to kill you!!!"

However, they ignored his death threat. The laughter was too loud for it to make the threat… intimidating. Team 9 watched as Team 7 (or at least technically Team 7 as Sakura was still knocked out) clean the sty. Naruto had his clones help with the bulk of the cleaning, and Sasuke was still aflame from embarrassment. He was receiving mock wolf calls from Ami who was so far still enjoying the whole thing, and was writing something on her notebook.

The Uchiha did not want to know. He did not care. He wanted out of his dress. He wanted out of this pigsty. He wanted to disappear, and as the laughter grew louder, he was tempted to add on his ambition list to kill a certain blonde for embarrassing him like this.

Still… he calmed down somewhat. It was only for one day. No permanent harm done. Right?

* * *

The next day, in front of the Hokage Tower, the people noticed someone had built a small wooden kiosk. Behind it was Naruto, with a few of his shadow clones calling people around them to approach.

Curious, most civilians and some approached.

"Come one come all!" Naruto called. "Feast your eyes on these! Classical! Rare! Once in a lifetime only! See your idol take the step he had never took before… see the heroic Uchiha dress up in a maid costume, just for you!"

All the young kunoichis suddenly flocked in, interested. They were shocked and awed when they had spotted the pictures. The blonde Uzumaki wasn't kidding! There it was… clear as day. Pictures of Uchiha Sasuke in a very fashionable maid outfit he had worn on the farm yesterday… but oddly, the pictures weren't taken from the farm. Nor did he actually do such ridiculous poses.

One had Sasuke holding a bunch of flowers, looking at the camera demurely. One had him spreading his arms towards the camera, inviting for an embrace. One had him throwing a kiss. And the others were even more ridiculous poses, which was more than enough for the rabid fan girls who were still shell-shocked to see such pictures of their idol.

Naruto's clones were busy as the mob of rabid fan girls grabbed their wallets out and began purchasing. The real Naruto sat at the back, fanning himself with paper bills as more customers arrived.

"Nyahahaha!" Naruto laughed slightly, feeling proud. That was rather easy money… and all it took was a henge and a few pictures. He was making a killing.

"Yo… what are you doing?" Kakashi called, arriving with Team 7. They were looking for their missing teammate, and when they found him, he was in the midst of a mob of girls, purchasing something from him.

Sasuke said nothing, only looking towards the kunoichi's shouting towards Naruto's clones, shouting for pictures, and giving money. Curious, he took a cautious step forward, looking at what the blonde had been peddling… and his eyes widened as he realized what was being sold.

"WHAT!?" Sasuke dashed towards the blonde, pushing aside the girls who were surprised at his arrival. His jaw dropped. "Wha… how… where…"

Then it hit him. His eyes went narrow, promising to maim and murder his target. Uzumaki Naruto. He couldn't stop shaking.

"U…zumaki…!" Sasuke growled, his hands going together, ready to form seals as he went for a fire jutsu. He was going to fry the blonde and those pictures he had been selling in one swift stroke.

"Uh… Sasuke… you do know you just dove into a nest of your fan girls?" Naruto asked dumbly, slightly surprised at the Uchiha's appearance.

There was a momentary pause as the raven-haired genin realized what Naruto had been saying was true. It was not long before Naruto's little picture sale was forgotten as the real deal appeared right in front of the fan girls' very eyes. The scream of awe had reached every corner of the village and a torturous roar followed. A cloud of dust rose as a stampede found its way on the streets, one very pissed off looking Sasuke on the lead, escaping from a pack of wild fan girls, leaving behind a rather peeved looking Naruto, who began to pick up the merchandise he had been trying to sell.

"Well… what did you know," Naruto sighed, calling his clones. "He just had to ruin it…"

Then, there was a heavy feeling of dread as the blonde Uzumaki felt a cold chill go down his spine. One very strong hand swiftly came down towards his head, locking him in place. Naruto chuckled nervously, knowing full well who had just grabbed him. He slowly turned his head, and saw the scary face of his teammate, Sakura.

"Uh… hehehe… hi Sakura," the blonde greeted nervously.

"How much?" Sakura whispered, deathly silent.

"Um… for you… I'll give Teammate Discount," Naruto declared.

"Good boy."

**To Be Continued**

**

* * *

**

**Omake 1**

Sakura looked at her chest, and towards the cow. She touched her chest, and then gently touched the cow's udders. She sighed. She pretty much hated it when Naruto was right.

**

* * *

**

**Omake 2**

Morino Ami giggled as she slowly began to shade her drawing. Her eyes moved, right and left, her mind slowly thinking as she began to draw a conversation bubble on her drawing. Buds' brother was a frigging genius. Next comic-con, she had finally something to give with her group.

Maybe some expansion on the plot here and there, and maybe some colors, but… oh, crap. Taking out her black eraser, she began to erase her slight mistake. She began to laugh as her little doujin began to take form. This will be an instant hit.

_**He is Uchiha's Master**_

Hmmm… maybe the title was a bit too much, but the drawing of Sasuke in a maid uniform, collar and a leash. This will be the yaoi fangirls' wet dreams.

Morino Ami knew she was going to make a killing.

**

* * *

**

_Author's Notes: _

_Well, there you go. Two chapters at once… or at least I did both at once. My editor was too busy to edit this one for me, so I gone and did it myself. I separated them because the first one was actually a side story, a supplement on the plot timeline. Not very accurate, but I promise as the story goes, it'll be explored somewhat. I also want to give a warning as the next chapter (if there will be one) will explore the Wave Arc… and I'm pretty much empty of jokes. It may get somewhat more serious then. So… take care guys. Later. _


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